A New Boy
by djenie
Summary: Thirteen year old Sam Carter has a new boy in her class. After a brief acquaintance, they lose touch for many years.
1. Chapter 1

**Slight spoilers for Children of the Gods, Emancipation and Broca Divide, all in Season 1. **

**1980**

Thirteen-year-old Samantha Carter slid into her desk in Mr. Kelley's eighth grade homeroom just as the bell rang signaling the start of the school day. She looked around the room, grinning at her friends, some of whom she hadn't seen all summer. Nikki had a different haircut. Ben had grown a couple of inches. Lila was still mooning over Vince. Most of her friends were Air Force brats, like her. She didn't notice anyone missing – that meant no one's dad had been transferred.

The boy beside her in the next row was a stranger. He was slender and hunched a little bit over his desk. His brown hair was too long and flopped over his ears and forehead, and he wore glasses.

"Hi," she said. "My name's Sam."

He turned partway toward her, reluctant. She saw that his eyes were a clear light blue. He pushed the hair out of his face with a funny, backhand gesture. "Hi," he mumbled.

"You just move here?" she asked.

He nodded.

"Your dad in the Air Force?"

A shake this time.

"Where did you live before?"

"Here."

"You mean here in Springfield?" she asked, puzzled. "How come I never saw you before?"

"Different school."

"Oh. So what's your dad do?"

Shrug. "Work."

Sam hated giving up on conversations, but this one was tough. "Where do you live?"

"Gardner Street."

"So do I!" she said brightly. "What number?"

Another shrug.

"You don't know what number?"

"Six hundred something… I think."

"I live at 507."

He didn't respond to that.

Sam drew a breath. She couldn't think of anything else to ask. Luckily Mr. Kelley cleared his throat just then and quieted the class down. He began calling the roll. The class members answered to their names.

"Daniel Wheeler." Mr. Kelley said.

The boy beside Sam made a sound but Mr. Kelley didn't hear him.

"Daniel Wheeler?" he repeated, looking around the room.

The boy put his hand up. "Here."

"Welcome to James Monroe Junior High, Danny," Mr. Kelley said.

The boy mumbled something in reply.

After a moment, Mr. Kelley went on with the roll call. When he was finished, he stood up and came around to the front of his desk. "I hope you all had a good summer." Most of the kids nodded in response and he went on. "You should all have your class schedule. If anyone didn't get it yet, please see me after the bell rings for first period. Yes, Sal?" he said to the raised hand.

"Mr. Kelley, is Ms. Mahoney still teaching 8th grade English?" A blond boy with a very short haircut looked a bit apprehensive.

"Yes, I believe she is, Sal. Why?"

"English is my first class," Sal mumbled. Several students laughed.

Mr. Kelley raised a hand. "Enough. If there's a problem, Sal, stay and I'll see if I can help."

A few other kids asked questions. After about 5 minutes the bell rang. Chairs were shoved back and voices raised in conversation. "Have a good day!" Mr. Kelley called over the noise.

Carrie, one of Sam's friends, appeared at her elbow and started talking. The two girls walked out of the room together. In the crowded hallway, they paused. "What's your first class?" Carrie asked.

"English, with Ms. Mahoney," Sam grinned.

"What a way to start the day," Carrie said. "Mine's math. Oh, I wish you were in my math class!" They compared schedules. "Well, we have history together 4th period. And PE sixth," she said. "Oh, look, study hall in the library last period, too."

"I'll see you in history, then." Sam waved good-bye as her friend started off in one direction, and she turned in the other. _Ms. Mahoney, here I come,_ she thought. As she started off, she noticed the new boy, Daniel, standing by the wall just outside Mr. Kelley's office, looking lost. She went over. "Hi. It's Daniel, right? Can I help you?"

"Thanks," he mumbled, not meeting her eyes. "Do you know where room 36 is?"

"Yes. That's where I'm going. Come on." They started down the hall, and Sam kept on talking. "That's Ms. Mahoney's class. You have English first? So do I. That's a good one to get behind you first thing in the day."

"Why?" Daniel asked.

"Ms. Mahoney has been teaching a long time," Sam said, trying to be diplomatic. _Like since before the Flood!_ "She still does things like they did years ago."

"Like what?" he wanted to know.

"Oh, like making you diagram sentences. And look up word meanings."

"Oh."

"And learn grammar rules. She'll give us a grammar quiz every week."

He actually looked slightly interested. "That's how you learn language structure."

"Okay," she looked at him thoughtfully. "I'm guessing you won't have any trouble in Ms. Mahoney's class."

"Do you?"

"No. It's just kind of boring," she admitted. "I'd much rather be in science. This year I'm taking chemistry and biology."

"Biology is on my schedule, but not chemistry," he said.

"Eighth graders all take biology. Not usually chemistry, tho."

"So what makes you special?"

He didn't ask the question in a snotty tone, just as if he wanted to know.

"I'm good at science," she replied after a moment. They had reached room 36. It was already half filled with noisy kids, and several spoke to Sam as she and Daniel entered. "I like to sit near the windows. The light's better." She headed that way and he followed her, and took the desk behind her.

Ms. Mahoney was a small, grey-haired woman in her sixties. She looked tough and disagreeable. She didn't greet the class, merely stood up front looking at them until they quieted, then began calling the roll. Last on the list was Daniel Wheeler.

"Not my name!" Sam heard Daniel mutter in irritation, but he answered anyway.

The rest of the day went as well as the first day of school usually does. Sam saw Daniel again in her history class, but Carrie corralled her, and she didn't get a chance to speak to him. She noticed that he answered a few questions in class, things about the ancient Greeks and Romans that Mr. Ames obviously hadn't expected anyone to know. He was also in her biology class, but he sat in the back of the room, and she was up front. After school she talked to some of her friends for a bit, and then headed home. Her house was only a few blocks away and she always walked. She caught up with Daniel at an intersection; he looked uncertain which way to turn.

"Gardner Street is that way," she said, pointing to the right. "One block over, two blocks up." She started to walk in that direction.

"Why not two blocks up, one block over?" he asked, falling in step with her.

She laughed. "Because that street dead ends, and there's no cross street. Trust me, I know what I'm doing. Why didn't you ride the bus, if you don't know the way?"

"I didn't know which one to take," he admitted. "Besides, I like to walk."

"It's bus number eleven, if you need it some other time."

"Thanks."

They walked in silence until after the left turn onto the next street.

"I saw you in history class," he commented.

"I'm sorry I didn't speak," she said. "My friend Carrie was talking a mile a minute. You did a good job answering Mr. Ames' questions."

"They were easy ones. He seems like a good teacher."

"Yeah, he is. Everybody likes him. He even makes history interesting."

"I love history."

They came to Gardner Street a few minutes later. "My house is down there, at the end of the block," Sam said, pointing left.

"That's mine." Daniel pointed to a grey house kitty-corner from where they stood. "Bye." He headed across the street.

"See you tomorrow." Sam frowned, puzzled. Her parents knew the people who lived in the house Daniel had indicated. Their name was indeed Wheeler, but they'd lived there for years. And they didn't have children. She watched until Daniel went into the house, then started in the direction of home, remembering what she had overheard him say in English class, about Wheeler not being his name. _Where had he come from?_

She started out for school early the next morning, and loitered along the block until she saw Daniel appear. Then she sped up a little and caught up with him halfway down the next block.

He didn't look happy to see her, and responded in monosyllables to her attempts at conversation. Finally she got exasperated. "Look, if you want to be by yourself, just say so. I'll leave you alone."

He really looked at her for the first time, pushed his hair aside with the back of his hand. "Sorry," he said. "My day didn't start very well. I got in trouble for staying up late reading. And then I didn't wake up on time. Not your fault."

"I like to read late, too. My Dad gets all over me about it. What were you reading?"

"A Latin book."

"Seriously? In Latin?"

"Yes."

"You can read Latin?"

He nodded. "I like languages."

"But, Latin?!"

"A lot of English is based on Latin," he pointed out.

"Yeh, I know that." She was quiet for a few paces. "I can read a little French."

"That's good. I speak French. And German." The way he said it implied that it was nothing unusual.

"Where'd you learn that?"

"My parents."

"Your parents taught you French and German?" she asked in disbelief.

He nodded. "Yes, they did."

She turned and looked him in the eyes; he was not lying.

Sam didn't know what to say. She didn't really know much about the Wheelers, but she was pretty sure they didn't speak any foreign languages. Still, it would be really rude to contradict Daniel. Besides, she liked him and didn't want to make him mad at her.

The second day of school went pretty much like the first. Classes were boring or annoying or challenging. Carrie was as talkative as ever. The rest of her friends were full of the usual talk about boys and clothes and homework. Funny how fast a routine got hold of you, Sam thought.

She noticed how smart Daniel sounded in English and history classes, and how he stared silently out the window in biology. She also noticed that he almost never talked to any of the other kids.

Sam and Daniel continued to walk to and from school together most of the time. She still did nearly all the talking and his answers to her questions were usually brief and uninformative, but he seemed content to walk with her. By the end of the second week, she didn't really know much more about him than she had the first day.

On Tuesday of the third week, Sam's mom picked her up from school because she had a dentist appointment. Afterward they went to the supermarket. On the way home, they passed the Wheelers' house.

"Mom," Sam asked, "You and Dad are friends with the Wheelers, right?"

"Not close friends, but yes, I guess so." Sam's mom pulled the car into their driveway, and they started unloading the groceries.

"There's a new boy in my class," Sam said. "His name is Daniel. He lives with the Wheelers."

Grace Carter looked at Sam in surprise. "Really?"

"They don't have any kids, do they?"

"No." Grace shook her head. She handed Sam the last grocery bag and closed the car's hatchback.

Sam followed her mom into the house and helped her put the food away. "You know, it was funny, Mom. On the first day of school they called the roll and called his name. Daniel Wheeler. And I heard him say, sort of under his breath, _Not my name!_" She closed the refrigerator, and turned around. "I've been wondering what he meant."

Grace was looking at her daughter seriously. "Sam, I think the Wheelers have taken a foster child."

"Daniel is a foster kid?"

"It sounds like it. Kay Wheeler was saying early in the summer that they were thinking about it. I haven't seen her in a while. But it sounds like that's what happened."

"Oh." Sam thought a minute. "Well, that explains it. His name wouldn't be Wheeler, would it?"

"I wouldn't think so."

"But they should use his real name at school." It bothered Sam that Daniel wasn't given his own name. "That explains something else, too."

"What's that, dear?"

"Daniel reads Latin. And he speaks French and German. He told me his parents taught him. He must have meant his real parents. Why do you suppose he doesn't live with them...?"

She did not get a chance to find out the answer to that question. The next day, and the next, Daniel was not in school. When he was also absent on Friday, Sam hung back after homeroom, and asked Mr. Kelly about him.

"Danny isn't coming back," Mr. Kelly told her. He'd noticed that she was friendly with the new boy. "He's changed schools. I'm sorry, Sam. I really can't say any more than that."

"Okay. Thanks, Mr. Kelly."

She left the room and headed for English class thinking she was sorry to see Daniel go; she would miss him.

**1997**

Captain Samantha Carter was self-conscious as she entered the SGC cafeteria. She'd stayed in her lab most of the day—she was doing that a lot lately! Less than a month with SG-1, and she'd managed to make an idiot of herself at every turn! First there was that embarrassing scene in the briefing room when she met the team—she'd been so knocked out by meeting Col. O'Neill—God, every female atom in her body had gone haywire! And then the planet Simarka, where women were property, and she was kidnapped and sold! _Then_ she got the Broca virus; just the thought of _that_ made her blush all over.

If she hadn't been starving, she wouldn't have come to the cafeteria at all.

She pushed open the door and made a beeline for the food line. But of course she'd seen the colonel sitting over there talking to Teal'c and Major Harmon. It felt as if his eyes were boring into her back as she hurried down the line, grabbing the first things she could reach. At the end she glanced at her tray; mashed potatoes, pulled pork and blue jello! She cringed.

Turning around, she looked around for a seat. The colonel was giving his attention to Teal'c, thank goodness. There weren't many empty tables. Then she caught sight of Dr. Jackson, sitting alone on the opposite side of the room. They'd seemed to get along all right so far, and she felt sad for him because his wife had been taken by the Goa'uld. She headed his way.

He didn't see her coming. He was bending over a notebook on the table, pen in hand, his hair falling over his forehead into his eyes. She stopped at the table.

"Hi," she said. "Is it okay if I sit here?

He jumped, startled, looked up at her. "Oh. Hi. Sure, I guess so." He pushed his hair out of his face with an odd backhanded shove.

Sam's jaw dropped, and then she smiled the brightest smile Daniel had ever seen. "Oh my God! It's you!" she exclaimed.

He blinked, glanced around. Several people were looking their way. "Uh-huh. Yeah? So?"

She put her tray down, and sat, still smiling. "You don't remember me, do you?"

"Sure. You're Captain Carter. Saw you this morning."

She laughed. "No. No! I mean from... what, probably sixteen, seventeen years ago. Springfield. James Monroe Junior High?"

Daniel was staring at her blankly. "Sorry. I don't know what you're talking about."

"Guess you made more of an impression on me than I did on you," she said wryly. "Springfield, Maryland. My Dad was stationed at Baker Air Field from 1979 til 1981—it must have been one of those years. You were in my class for just a few weeks, at the beginning of the year and then you moved away. Eighth grade, I think. You lived on the same street we did, and we walked to and from school together a few times."

Daniel was frowning. "Okay. I sort of remember. The talkative girl. That was you?"

"Yeh. I guess I _was _pretty talkative back then." She was beginning to get the idea that he wasn't interested in old times. "Sorry. I just always wondered what happened to you."

"I moved, I guess. Why would you remember me so well? I couldn't have been there more than three weeks or so."

"Oh." Now Sam wasn't sure what to say. "You were living with our neighbors. The Wheelers? Anyway, that first day at school the teacher called you Daniel Wheeler, and I heard you mutter something about it not being your name..." She sort of trailed off, squirming nervously. "I just always wondered about you, that's all."

"Why? What did the school tell you about me?" He sounded faintly hostile.

"Nothing! The school didn't say anything. Just that you had moved. But, my mom... well, she told me the Wheelers were fostering you." He didn't say anything, so she went on. "It _was _you, then."

"Yeah. It was me."

"I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to upset you. I was just really excited when I recognized you. That gesture you make pushing up your hair—you did the same thing back then... Wow, I just really can't keep my foot of my mouth around here!" The last was a response to the eye roll he gave her. "I'm sorry," she repeated.

"It's okay." His expression had cleared. "It was a long time ago. I remember you now, but I really didn't until you reminded me. There were... well, a lot of foster homes, a lot of schools. Yeh. I remember Springfield. I was there for over three years. "

"Not with the Wheelers."

"No. First I was with a cousin of my mom's. But that didn't work out, so they put me back in the foster system." Daniel glanced up at her, could see the questions she was holding herself back from asking. "My parents were killed when I was nine. I was with foster parents in New York for a couple of years, and then this cousin surfaced down in Maryland. They sent me there. I was a problem, I didn't adjust very well. No one kept me very long. The Wheelers had me for two months, and then they realized they couldn't do it. I don't really blame them. I didn't make it easy."

"Really? I can't imagine you giving people trouble."

"I try not to now," he admitted.

"You seemed pretty quiet back then," she said. "I liked you."

"You didn't know me long enough." He grinned.

"I'm sorry about your parents," Sam said. "My mom was killed that next summer, so I can understand. I was no fun to live with."

"Thanks," he said. "I'm sorry I wasn't nicer to you back then. We might've been friends." Daniel gestured at the tray in front of her. "Your lunch is probably getting cold. What is that anyway?"

She poked her fork into the grease congealing on the pork, and laughed. "Ugh. Cold barbeque. Cold potatoes. Maybe the jello is decent!" She grabbed her spoon and took a bite. "Not bad. I could actually learn to like this!"

The two of them laughed together.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

**I wiggled Sam and Daniel's ages a bit, so they're about the same age in the story.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Spoiler for The First Commandment, Season 1.**

Colonel Jack O'Neill felt he was fully capable of doing two things at once. Right now he was listening to Teal'c as the big Jaffa warrior told him and Harmon about Chulak; but Jack was also aware of Captain Carter and Dr. Jackson laughing together at their table across the room. They'd gotten pretty chummy all of a sudden! She was even offering him a bite of her blue jello! Yuck! Daniel didn't seem like the type to attract beautiful women—but his Abydonian wife, Sha're, was a knockout, and Captain Carter certainly was easy on the eyes. Lately Carter had been practically invisible—hiding in her lab, except when SG1 was called up for a mission. She did love going through the Stargate! Every time he saw her, though, she avoided looking at him and ran the other way. Wonder what that was about? She'd sure been hot enough for him when she caught that virus!

Teal'c asked him a question, and he quickly rerouted his attention back to his own table to reply. And now Harmon was getting to his feet. "Out on another recon," he commented before he left.

Jack and Teal'c exchanged a few more casual remarks. Out of the corner of his eye, Jack was watching as Carter and Jackson talked earnestly.

"Are you wishing to court Captain Carter, O'Neill?" Teal'c asked suddenly.

"What!?" Jack spun in his chair to face the Jaffa. "Am I what... No!" He realized that his voice had risen, and lowered it quickly. "No, of course not! Why would you ask such a thing?"

"I apologize, O'Neill," Teal'c said calmly. "I am unfamiliar with your Taur'i rituals. You have been watching Captain Carter quite intently ever since she entered the cafeteria. Among my people, such overt interest in a woman is generally a sign of sexual intent."

Jack choked. "Se... No, no, no!" He paused to catch his breath, and lowered his voice even more. "Teal'c, buddy, those kinds of comments should not be made in public places. Anyway, I wasn't watching Carter. I was... uh... thinking about—Daniel!" he said quickly, trying to rescue himself.

"Ah," Teal'c said understandingly. "I see. It is Dr. Jackson who interests you."

"Ye—no! I mean, not like _that!_" Jack glanced around, and was relieved to see that no one seemed to be paying any attention to them."Look... uh. We need to have a long talk—somewhere else!" He got to his feet. "Let's go down to my office."

"I have not finished my lunch, O'Neill," Teal'c pointed out. "Nor have you." He indicated Jack half-filled tray.

"Bring yours with you," Jack ordered. "I'm not hungry." He barreled for the door.

Teal'c raised an eyebrow and after a moment, picked up his tray and followed.

For the first time in weeks, Sam had actually forgotten about Colonel O'Neill, she was so engrossed in talking with Daniel. They both noticed the Colonel's abrupt departure from the cafeteria, however.

"Jack never leaves food," was Daniel's comment. "He must not be feeling well."

Sam and Daniel were finding they were very comfortable with each other. When they had met on Abydos, Sam had liked Daniel immediately, but things had gotten chaotic very quickly when the Goa'uld had attacked, and taken Sha're and Skaara as hosts. Since then, an understandably distressed Daniel had kept mostly to himself except on missions, and as Sam was behaving the same way, they had barely run into each other until now.

While they had been talking, Sam had eaten all her blue jello, but the cold meat and potatoes sat ignored on her tray. After a while she realized she was still hungry, and went to get something more palatable. Daniel got some coffee, and they continued to talk as she ate.

"Are you working on something?" She indicated the notebook he had been writing in when she joined him.

"I'm trying to recall more of the gate addresses on the Abydonian cartouche. There were so many of them; the videos you took didn't cover all the walls. I've been carrying the notebook around in case something occurs to me."

"The computer has only calculated the location of about two dozen of them so far. Most are relatively close to Earth. How far do you think the Stargate system extends?"

Daniel gave a clueless shrug. "All over the galaxy? Even beyond? I don't know."

"And we thought it only reached Abydos. Do _you_ think the Goa'uld built it?" she asked.

He raised his eyebrows at her tone. "Don't you?"

"I don't know. Just a feeling."

"Funny you should say that. You know that the Abydonians weren't allowed to learn writing, don't you?"

"Yes. That was in the mission report from the original trip."

"Well, some of them did it anyway," Daniel said. "I was there a while before I found this out. Sha're's father was one. Sha're knew some writing—in fact, she's the one who showed me the hidden room with the cartouche of symbols. Anyway, they spoke the symbols as if they were letters, or maybe syllables. But some of the syllables didn't fit into the pattern of the Abydonian dialect, or even in the Goa'uld language."

"So, you think there was a third language being used for the gate symbols?" she asked.

"I know it's not much. But it makes me wonder if there was another group of people."

"Well, you're the linguist. If it makes you wonder, then it's probably worth more attention. Have you said anything to General Hammond?"

"No. I did mention it to Jack. He said—well, he didn't really say much. I don't think he was very interested. He told me to concentrate on the addresses."

"I think you should talk to the General."

"That'd be going over Jack's head, wouldn't it?"

She bit her lip. "Yeah. And if it were me, that might mean trouble. But you're a civilian—a consultant. And you don't seem to have any problem holding your own with the Colonel."

He looked at her, surprised. "Is that what it looks like? He swats me down at every opportunity!"

"But you keep getting up and coming back for more," she pointed out. "I think he's a little intimidated by you."

"Intimidated? Jack?" He shook his head. "I doubt it."

"Well, maybe that word's too strong. He respects you."

"Ha! He tolerates me. I'm just the new guy on the team."

"No," Sam said. "Besides, we're all new. No, I think it's more than that. I think he feels a bond with you. After all, you went through the first mission together. And he kept your secret as long as he could."

"That wasn't really for me. That was for Skaara, and those kids on Abydos. He wanted to do what he could to keep them safe. Skaara reminded him of his son."

"The Colonel has a son? I didn't even know he was married!"

Daniel looked uncomfortable. "Well, he isn't married now. They divorced after their son died."

"Oh, no!" Sam clapped a hand to her mouth. "His son died? That's awful."

"Yeah. It was just before the first mission to Abydos."

"What happened? Was he sick?"

"No. He accidently shot himself with Jack's service pistol."

Sam was speechless, staring at Daniel with huge, horrified eyes.

"Please don't tell anyone I told you," Daniel said. "I shouldn't have said anything."

She shook her head. "I won't. What a terrible thing," she whispered.

It took a while for their conversation to get back on track after that, but eventually they returned to the subject of the gate symbols.

"I think you should speak to General Hammond about the language," Sam told him.

"I'll think about it. I'll look at the symbols again and see if anything else comes to mind."

She glanced up at the clock on the wall. "Oh, gosh. I've been in here nearly two hours! I better get back to my lab."

"I should get going, too. Let me get some more coffee, and I'll ride up with you."

They left the cafeteria and walked to the elevator. Daniel pressed the call button and they waited. When it arrived and they stepped in, he glanced at Sam. "What level?"

"My lab's on 18," she said.

"Ah. So's mine."

He punched the button for 18. The doors slid shut and the car started to rise. They got out on their floor, and met Colonel O'Neill a few steps down the corridor.

"There you are, Daniel. Captain Carter." Jack's eyes swept over Sam briefly. He saw her hand tighten into a fist. What the hell, he thought.

"You looking for me, Jack?" Daniel asked.

"Both of you. SG-1 is heading out."

"Nothing's scheduled," Daniel said. "What's happened?"

"As you both know, SG-9 has been out of contact on the planet Avnil. There's been no word from Captain Hanson or his team for four days." Jack's tone was clipped and hard. "An hour ago the gate opened and Lt. Connor's signal was received, but no one came through. We've dialed out and tried to make contact twice since then, with no response. General Hammond is declaring the team MIA, and sending us to try and find them. Briefing in ten minutes, we leave in one hour."

"Okay," Daniel replied.

Jack shot Sam a look. She dropped her eyes. "Yes, sir," she said.

The briefing yielded very little more information than the Colonel had given them in the corridor. "We know at least one member of the team was still alive when the gate was activated," General Hammond concluded the briefing. "Your job is to find any survivors and bring them home." He waited for acknowledgements all around. As they rose from the table, Hammond turned to Sam. "Captain Carter, I will understand if you wish to exclude yourself from this mission."

"No, sir!"

"Why is that, sir?!"

Sam and Jack's exclamations overlapped.

Hammond looked at Jack. "Colonel?"

"Why would she want to be excluded, General?" His answer was to the General, but his eyes bored into Sam's. "Captain?" he questioned.

Great! Sam thought. Another chance to humiliate myself. "No, sirs!" She snapped out, stiffening to attention. "I do _not _wish to be excluded!"

"Very well, Captain," General Hammond said. "Dismissed, people."

The Colonel's eyes were still locked onto Sam's as he responded to the General. "Yes, sir."

Sam left the briefing room as fast as she dared. She heard Daniel trying to run interference.

"Jack. Can I talk to you about something..."

"Not now, Daniel." And rapid footsteps behind her.

He caught up to her in the corridor. "Just a minute, Captain."

She stopped and turned slowly toward him, tried to force herself to look him in the eye, but hers slid away.

"Captain?" he asked.

"Because..." she began, and chewed her lip. He waited. "Because... up until three months ago I was..." Her voice trailed off to a mumble.

"I didn't hear you, Captain."

She cleared her throat. More footsteps behind her, and Daniel stopped beside them.

"Jack..."

"Daniel," the Colonel growled.

"It's okay, Daniel," Sam said, forcing strength into her voice. "Colonel, until three months ago, I was engaged to be married to Captain Hanson, SG-9's CO. I broke off the engagement because he had become too... too controlling." She risked a glance at the Colonel's face. Was it her imagination, or had those brown eyes softened a bit.

"I see," he said, and there was something almost understanding in his tone. "And you're okay with going on this mission, Carter?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good," he replied, nodding almost pleasantly. "All right. Get geared up, and be in the gate room in fifteen." He turned and strode away down the corridor. "Well, come on, Daniel," he threw back over his shoulder. "You said you want to talk to me."


	3. Chapter 3

**Note; Spoiler for ****The First Commandment****, Season 1. This chapter takes place immediately after that mission.**

Sam was in a daze as she exited the gate and started down the ramp. Halfway down, she stumbled and would have fallen if Daniel had not grabbed her arm.

"Sam? Are you okay?" He asked. He reached over and took her weapon, and handed it off to one of the airmen waiting to collect their gear. "Sam?"

She shook her head. "I'm okay, Daniel."

"What's the matter, Captain?" The Colonel stopped beside them.

"Nothing, sir. I tripped, that's all." She avoided his eyes.

He stared at her for a beat. "All right. Everybody, report to the infirmary for post-mission check. Especially you, Carter."

Daniel flashed Jack a questioning look; Jack gestured toward the door. "Go with her, Daniel," he said quietly.

Daniel nodded once, and took Sam's arm again. "Let's go, Sam."

Jack watched Daniel and Sam exit the gate room as he and Teal'c stripped off their gear and handed it in. He was frowning. He'd seen the look of horror on her face when Hanson's former followers on Avnil had thrown him through the open wormhole; the code had not been sent, the iris was in place.

The brief conversation he had had with Carter just before they returned came back to mind.

"He told me to end it, Colonel," she'd said, a look of anguish on her face. "I had the gun. I should have done it..." He would never forget how wounded her eyes had looked before she dropped her gaze away from his. Did she think she'd been a coward?

He'd searched for the right words to say to her. "Killing a man is no badge of honor, Captain," he'd said finally. "That commandment about not killing—every time you break it, you take one step closer to men like Hanson."

"Thanks, sir," she'd murmured without looking at him.

"O'Neill?" Teal'c's voice broke his reverie. "Is something wrong?"

"Nope." He straightened. "I'm fine, T. Let's go let Doc Napoleon poke and prod us needlessly."

"Indeed." Teal'c followed Jack from the gate room.

Dr. Janet Fraiser frowned as she listened to the sounds in her stethoscope. "Your blood pressure's quite low, Captain," she said. "How do you feel?"

Sam tried to gather her thoughts. "Cold. A little sick..."

"Dizzy?''

"A bit..."

"Look at me..." The doctor had to turn Sam's head with a hand on her cheek. Sam's eyes were unfocused and dilated.

"Lie down, Captain." Dr. Fraiser guided the suddenly pale Carter down onto the exam bed, slid a pillow under her feet to raise them and grabbed a blanket from the rack beside the bed to cover her.

Something was wrong with Sam's vision. Everything looked gray, vague. She was having trouble catching her breath. She felt a sharp prick on the inside of her elbow just as things went black.

Jack and Teal'c walked into the infirmary. Jack stared at the unconscious form of Carter on the bed, then up at Fraiser as she hooked up the IV.

"What the hell, Doc?" he demanded.

Just then Daniel rounded the corner, and took in the scene. "Sam!"

"She passed out," Fraiser told them. She was taking Carter's pulse. "Too fast. Shock. What happened to her out there? How do you two feel?"

"I'm fine," Jack said.

"As am I," Teal'c assured her.

"Sit up there," she gestured Jack and Teal'c to the next two beds. "I'll be with you in a few minutes." She pulled down the oxygen tube from over the head of the bed, and threaded it around Sam's head. "Tell me what happened."

"She saw her ex-fiance die out there on Avnil," Daniel told her

Janet looked up at him. "Fiance?"

"She was engaged to Captain Hanson up until three months ago."

"How did he die?" Janet wanted to know.

"He was thrown through the gate," Jack said. "The iris was closed."

She flinched.

Jack went on. "A little while earlier, she held a gun on him and tried to make herself shoot him. She couldn't do it."

"All of that would put anybody in shock," Daniel observed.

A groan from Sam made Janet reach out and place a hand on her shoulder. Sam opened her eyes, and blinked as she saw the doctor bending over her. "What happened...?"

"Lie still, Captain. You fainted. How do you feel now? Sick? Dizzy?"

Sam drew a breath. "No. Better—okay, I think." She tried to move, but Janet stopped her.

"Stay still. Just rest a little bit, while I check out your teammates." Janet smiled at her. "You'll be fine. Dr. Jackson has already been checked. He'll stay here with you." She glanced up at Daniel. "Don't let her get up yet."

He nodded, moved over next to the bed and placed a hand on Sam's arm.

After checking them over, Janet sent Jack and Teal'c on their way, and shooed Daniel out with them. She kept Sam in the infirmary, to make sure her vitals had all stabilized. After a while, she let Sam sit up, and when she showed no further symptoms, the doctor removed the IV.

"Would you like to talk about it, Captain?" Janet asked.

"About what?" But Sam's eyes did not meet the doctor's.

"Your teammates told me what happened on Avnil."

Sam's face closed. "I'm fine, doctor."

"Captain." Janet waited until Sam reluctantly looked up at her. "You know that I'm responsible for the health of all the SG teams," the doctor said gently. "That doesn't mean just physical health. I have to be sure you are all emotionally able to handle this job. You've just been through an emotional trauma, Captain. If you don't want to talk to me, I can recommend someone else. But I can't clear you for offworld duty until I know you've gotten through this. Do you understand?"

Sam nodded slowly. "I understand. I need a little time to think. Then I'll come back. I'd rather talk to you than a stranger."

"All right. Good. Just let me know," Janet agreed. "Soon, though."

"I will."

Sam escaped the infirmary as quickly as she could, and headed for the elevator, hoping she would not run into any of her team. She made it to the 18th level, but Daniel's door was open and he came out, concern written all over his face.

"Are you okay, Sam?"

"I'm fine, Daniel." She kept moving toward her own lab, and Daniel followed.

"What did Dr. Fraiser say?"

"She said it was just... shock, I guess."

"I'm not surprised, after what happened. Is there anything I can do?"

"I don't know..." She hesitated, looking at Daniel, and suddenly she realized that the doctor was right—she did need to talk about this. "Look, Daniel. Do you have a few minutes? To talk?"

"Sure. I got all the time you need." He took her arm. "Let's go sit down."

He had a couple of chairs in his lab, so he led her in there and shut the door behind them.

"I didn't expect to feel like that when Jonas died," she began. "I suppose I thought because I decided I didn't want to marry him, that the feelings I'd had for him would just go away. But I guess they hadn't. When they threw him through the gate—my heart just... I don't know."

"How long did you know him?" Daniel asked gently.

"Almost two years. We met at Johnson Space Center, when I was first assigned to study the stargate. He's... he _was_ a very smart man. Degrees in physics and astrophysics from MIT before he joined the Air Force. We were on the team that developed the dialing computer. He was charming and funny, and always smiling..." Her voice broke, and she choked back a sob.

"It's okay, Sam." Daniel reached out and took her hand. "He must have been different back then," he encouraged.

Tears ran down her cheeks and she nodded. "He was. It was only after we started dating, a few months later... He got a little possessive, jealous. It was gradual. I thought it was sweet at first. He wanted to know where I was all the time, but it was lighthearted, you know. He didn't get angry or demanding. He just had this funny little pout..." She giggled. "It was very cute, and he never pushed it too far." She reached for a box of tissues on Daniel's desk, and wiped her tears. "We dated for about six months, and by then he'd become more demanding. He wanted us to move in together, and was annoyed when I resisted. Then I got reassigned to the Pentagon. He was pretty upset. I don't know how he did it, but he got himself assigned there, also. That was after the first mission to Abydos. The dialing computer was in place, and they had me working on other projects related to the gate. He was put on my team again. But he was different—more intense, impatient, angry sometimes. That was when he asked me to marry him. And I loved him, Daniel. I was sure I did! So, of course, I said yes." She covered her face with her hands.

"Of course you did," he agreed. "How was he after that?"

She lowered her hands and took another tissue and wiped more tears. "He was ecstatic at first—and he was the way he'd been in the beginning. Happy, funny, friendly to everyone. We went together and picked out a ring. He told the jeweler he was the luckiest man in the world." She stopped.

"But it didn't last," Daniel ventured.

"No. In fact, it didn't last long at all. Within a few weeks the jealousy and possessiveness started again. Only it was worse. He didn't want me to see my friends. He sulked if I made any plans that didn't include him. When my dad came to town Jonas demanded that he go with me to meet him—wouldn't let me have any private time with Dad. Needless to say, my father was not impressed, and the two of them had words. Dad was only there a couple of days—otherwise it might have all ended earlier than it did. Afterward, Jonas and I had a long talk. I explained how much it upset me for him to be rude to my Dad, and so possessive of me. He seemed to get it, and for a while he managed to keep himself under control. But it came back. And it got worse and worse. Until, finally I had enough."

"That's when you broke the engagement."

She nodded. "Yes. But I was a coward, and did it in a letter—mailed his ring back. I was a little afraid of him..."

"Did he ever hurt you, Sam?" Daniel interrupted.

She shook her head. "No. But... well, I didn't want to break it off in person. After I mailed the letter, I took two weeks leave and didn't tell anyone where I was going. He stormed into our offices and demanded to know where I was. My other team members told me he ranted and threatened. My CO wasn't there at the time, otherwise Jonas would probably have gotten into lots of trouble. He wrote me a vicious letter." Her mouth trembled; she bit her lip and went on. "By the time I got back from leave, he was gone. He'd been reassigned—here. So he was here when I came, a few weeks ago."

"How was he when you saw him again?"

"Like I said on Avnil—he seemed all right. He didn't have much to say to me. I didn't expect that he would. But he was calm and impersonal." She pressed her fingers to her temples. "But obviously, he wasn't all right. I wonder—if I hadn't showed up, would all this have happened..."

"It's not your fault, Sam," Daniel assured her. "He was a ticking time bomb. Something would have set him off."

"I feel like I should have been able to help him."

"Sam..."

"Somebody should have been able to," she insisted. "There was so much potential there..."

"Somebody _should've_ been able to," Daniel agreed. "But people like him are very good at hiding their true nature much of the time, and avoiding help. They don't believe they need it. He certainly didn't think so."

"I'm not sure about that," she said. "He knew he was a threat, Daniel. He told me to shoot him. He stood there and gave me time to do it." She squeezed her eyes shut. "I was too cowardly to do it."

"No, Sam," he said forcefully. "You were not a coward! Your only fault was in loving him once. He knew that, and he knew you wouldn't do it. Listen to me—he manipulated that whole scene."

"You think so? So maybe instead of being a coward, I'm just easy to manipulate..."

"Sam, stop it! You know better. Don't say things like that."

She looked contrite. "I'm sorry, Daniel. I'm just giving in to a little self pity, I guess."

"Well, don't do it again," he warned with a smile, then he became serious. "Cry for the Jonas you remember, Sam. But don't ever think any of it was your doing."

The tears welled up in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. Daniel moved his chair close, and wrapped his arms around her.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

A while later, Sam went back to the infirmary and found Dr. Fraiser in her office.

"You look better, Captain," the doctor said, noticing at once that Carter had color in her cheeks, and her demeanor had improved.

"I feel much better, Doctor," Sam said. "I had a long talk with Daniel. Well, I talked and he listened. You were right about needing to do that."

"Good." Fraiser smiled and indicated the chair in front of her desk. "Sit down and fill me in."

Sam took the chair. "I loved Jonas Hanson once. It didn't work out for us, and I thought I had put it behind me. But it was horrible to see him—the man he'd turned into. And to see him die like that. It really much hurt more than I would have believed it would. Daniel got the story out of me, and then let me cry on his shoulder for an hour." She looked the doctor in the eye.

"How do you feel now?"

"Relieved. Sad. I'll probably cry some more later. But I don't feel guilty or cowardly any more."

"Why would you feel either one of those things?" Janet asked.

"I had the chance to kill Jonas, and I couldn't do it. I thought I was being a coward. Daniel convinced me otherwise."

The doctor nodded. "Good."

"Do you want to hear the whole story?"

"I don't think it's necessary for you to repeat it, Captain. Unless you want to, of course. I can see by looking at you that you're much better than you were when you walked out of here earlier. And I'm very glad you have Dr. Jackson to talk to." She smiled. "I'll clear you for gate duty, provisionally. Come and check in with me before your next mission. Come in if you feel as if you need to talk to me. And definitely come in if you have any post-traumatic symptoms."

"I'll do that, Doctor. Thank you."

"You're welcome." Janet yawned suddenly, covering her mouth with her hands. "Oh... Excuse me! I guess I'm going to head to the cafeteria and get something to eat. And coffee! I'm on duty until midnight."

"I'm headed there, myself," Sam said. "I'll walk with you."

The two women left the infirmary together.


	4. Chapter 4

**Spoiler for ****Brief Candle****, season 1. Begins with a scene in the middle of that episode, after O'Neill has fallen victim to the rapid aging which affects the people of Argos.**

**Thank you for reading!**

Sam stared at the Colonel, speechless. In the few hours she had been gone back to the SGC, he had aged two decades.

"Oh, come on now, Captain," he said mildly. "Don't keep the elderly waiting. It's rude."

It was several beats before she could speak. "It isn't a virus," she said finally. "We came up empty. Dr. Fraiser is still working on it. It's going to take time."

"Time is one thing these people don't have, Sam," Daniel pointed out.

"Nor do I," the Colonel added.

Emotion rose up in Sam's throat, and she choked it back. "There's something else, Colonel. There are more of the organisms in your blood than in the Argosians'. On the order of a hundred times more." The last words were forced out.

"What does that mean, Captain?" The Colonel's voice was still level and mild.

"S...sir, at the rate you're aging—at the end of two weeks you'll be one hundred years old." She hated the obvious wobble in her voice.

"So in two weeks I'll be dead."

"Not if I can help it!" Sam snapped. She knew if she looked at him for another second she would break down and cry. Turning away quickly, she reached for the case she had brought through the gate. "I'd like to set up a lab here so I can work on a cure..."

"Negative, Captain!" For the first time O'Neill tone was sharp with stress. "You're going back. All of you. We're not bringing another disease back through that gate." He saw the resistance in their faces. "That's an order."

"Jack..." Daniel began.

"Don't you dare say good-bye!" the Colonel snapped. "You damn well better be coming back! Soon. Now get out of here." He walked away.

They watched him walk out of the room. Sam stared at the place where he had disappeared, biting her lip. Every fiber in her body wanted to run after him.

"O'Neill is correct," Teal'c's stated. "We can help him more by going back to find the cure." He turned to dial the gate. In a few moments the wormhole whooshed open.

Sam went to the door of the temple, and saw Kynthia, the young woman who had given the Colonel the marriage cake, join him as he walked across the village plaza and take his arm, leaning in to speak softly to him.

As she gazed after them, she felt Daniel hand on hers. "Teal'c's right, Sam. We're wasting time standing here. Let's go."

She let him lead her through the gate.

After forty-eight hours of sleepless investigation, they realized the 'organisms' were tiny machines—nanites—and General Hammond closed them down and ordered all the material destroyed to prevent them from spreading. Sam locked herself in her quarters, and curled into a ball on her bed and cried.

In the end it was the Colonel himself who solved the riddle, when he discovered the damaged transmitter, which controlled the nanites responsible for the Argosians' shortened life. The transmitter was in the statue of Pelops that the people had pulled down and broken. Once it was completely shut down, neutralizing the nanites, the Argosians could look forward to a normal lifespan.

And the Colonel's unnatural aging began to reverse itself. Sam was pretty certain that in a couple of weeks he would be back to normal, and was very excited when she told him the news. To her dismay, he turned to Kynthia; the lovely Argosian woman embraced him unabashedly, and the couple moved away together and talked in low tones.

At that moment, Sam realized that she was jealous! Jealous of Kynthia, because—she refused to take her reasoning any further! She turned and began to assemble their gear to return to the stargate. She was not surprised when the Colonel informed them that he was going to remain on Argos for a while—with Kynthia.

"At my age, I wouldn't be much help on any missions," he joked. "And it's a lot more comfortable here than at the SGC. Doc Fraiser would have me stuck in the infirmary while she did all kinds of useless tests. Besides, I might be able to help these people a little—it's gonna take some serious adjustment for them to get used to the idea of living 70 or 80 years instead of a hundred days."

Daniel had to agree that it made sense, especially the part about Dr. Fraiser! At the same time the look on Sam's face—the feelings she was trying so hard to hide—broke his heart. "Do you think General Hammond will be okay with you staying, Jack?" he asked as they were leaving.

"I don't see why not," O'Neill replied. "You explain it to him, Danny. Call it leave, if that works best."

"Maybe we should send back an entire team to help these people adjust," Daniel suggested. "A couple of psychologists, maybe, or... er... " He trailed off for a beat, then rallied; "Someone to keep you company."

O'Neill narrowed his eyes at the younger man. Even with the appearance of a ninety-year-old, the man was intimidating. "Don't do me any favors, Danny Boy," was all he said.

"Right." Daniel pushed his glasses up, glancing away, then back to Jack. "How long do you think you'll stay?"

"A week or two should do it—if Carter's right. I'll dial in now and then and give you a progress report."

"Okay. Bye, Jack." Daniel turned to follow Sam and Teal'c back toward the stargate.

He caught up with them as Teal'c was dialing home. Sam had gotten herself under control, he could see. She gave him a questioning glance. "He'll be along in a week or so," Daniel said. "He said he'll stay in touch."

The wormhole whooshed open, and Sam nodded as she picked up her pack and headed through.

Ten days later, when O'Neill walked through the gate, he was almost back to normal. In fact, he felt better than he had in years. There may have been a little unaccustomed grey in his hair, and a few extra laugh lines around his eyes, but both would fade in the next few days. Daniel and Teal'c met him in the gate room. He gave them a cheerful grin, like a man returning from a restful and pleasant vacation. As expected, Fraiser was laying in ambush, and whisked him off to the infirmary. He didn't even object.

"Where's Carter?" he asked as they followed Fraiser down the corridor. "I thought she'd want to see if her prediction of my recovery was accurate."

"I'm not sure," Daniel replied. "Haven't seen her today."

"CaptainCarter has left the base," Teal'c supplied. "I saw her checking out earlier this morning."

"Ah," was O'Neill's comment.

Daniel thought he heard something in Jack's voice. Was it disappointment? "SG-1's off the mission rotation. No reason to stay here all the time. She said something about looking for a house. Kinda sick of living on base myself," he added. "I've been thinking of finding a place."

Later, Daniel was in his lab when his phone rang. It was Sam.

"Hi, Daniel. What are you doing right now?"

"Nothing much. Working on a translation. Why?"

"Can you get away?" she asked. "I've found a house I like and I wanted to know what you think."

"Really! Yeah. I don't see why I can't come. I'd love to see it. Where are you?" She gave him the address and he jotted it down. "How far away from the Mountain is that?"

"Half an hour. How well do you know the city?"

"Just so-so."

"Get a cab. You can ride back with me."

"Good idea. I'll see you soon—oh, by the way, Jack got back an hour or so ago."

"Oh. How is he?" Her voice gave nothing away.

"Fine. Back to normal. Fraiser has him in the infirmary, checking him out."

"Of course she does. I'll see you in a little while, Daniel."

Sam closed her cell phone, and stared at it for a moment. So the Colonel was home from Argos. She was annoyed at the little leap of happiness that gave her. _Dammit! Get hold of yourself, Sam! He's your CO—and besides, he doesn't give a rat's dupa about you! Why does he have to be so damn sexy— Oh, God, it's more than that, and you know it. I am in __such__ deep trouble! Why'd I have to fall for him? I'm surprised he could stand to leave Kynthia—or maybe she came with him! No, Daniel would have said something. Oh, stop it, Sam! Don't be such an idiot! _

She forced her attention back to the house she was looking at. It was not a new one, probably thirty years old, but in excellent shape as far as she could tell. There were several things she liked very much about it. It was in a quiet residential area, near the outskirts of the city, where the lots were generous and all the houses had plenty of yard space. Across the street there was a park, and an open view of the mountains beyond. There was a covered front porch, with room enough for chairs, and even a small table. The inside was freshly painted, and the kitchen was new and modern. The previous owners had taken out walls to make the downstairs space open and airy.

She walked through the house to the kitchen. The entire back wall was glass, with sliding doors that opened onto a new deck. Behind the house were trees which screened the yard from the houses that backed up on this street, giving some added privacy.

Yes, Sam decided. She liked the house very much. It was big enough, with two bedrooms and a bath upstairs, and a large bathroom down. A small room off the front hall was the perfect size for an office/library.

She heard a car pull up and headed to the front door. Daniel was paying his cab driver, and she went out on the porch to greet him as he came slowly up the path, taking in the house's appearance as he walked. He climbed the steps and stood beside her.

"This is nice," he said. "I like the setting."

"Yeah, me too. Come on in."

They walked through the inside together, and he nodded his approval as they went. When he had seen it all, they returned to the large front room. "Well," he asked. "Are you going to buy it?"

"Would you?"

He thinks about that for a bit. "Yeah. If I were you, I think I would."

She smiled. "I want to find a contractor and have it checked out structurally, first. But I think I'm going to do it."

"Congratulations! You'll soon be a property owner." He hooked an arm around her neck and hugged her briefly. "And you have to have me over as a frequent houseguest."

"Absolutely." She kissed his cheek. "Nobody I'd rather play hostess to."

He raised an eyebrow. "Nobody?"

She blushed, and he was surprised to see her smile fall apart.

"Sam? What is it?"

"Oh. Nothing. Nothing." She tried to brush it away with a wave of her hand. But there were tears in her eyes.

"Okay, Sam. What's up?" Daniel put his arm around her. "What's happened?"

She sniffled and wiped her eyes. "Oh, Daniel," she sighed. "I've done something really stupid."

"You? I doubt it." But he saw she was serious and his tone softened. "Tell me."

"Promise not to tell anybody. Ever."

He nodded. "Okay. Never."

"I've gone and fallen for... somebody I have no chance with."

"Oh." Now he gets it. "Jack."

She pulled back and stared at him. "Oh, no! You knew? Am I that obvious?"

"I know you pretty well. And we spend a lot of time together. I doubt if anybody else would notice."

"Oh, God, I hope not!" Tears spilled over down her cheeks, and she wiped them away. "It was when I saw him with Kynthia that it hit me so hard. When he decided to stay on Argos."

"I noticed your reaction to that."

"You did? Damn! What should I do, Daniel? He's my CO! We can't have a relationship, even if he wanted to. I've got to get over it!"

He hugged her to him. "It's tough. I know. Just remember I'm here if you need me."

"Oh, Daniel." She put her arms around him. "I'm sorry! It's so much worse for you... with Sha're! I sound like a silly schoolgirl. I hope you know I'm here for you anytime, too. And I'm going to pull myself together, and get a handle on this." She squeezed him tightly for a moment then drew back, straightening her shoulders. "The first thing I'm going to do is buy this house. Moving in will give me plenty to think about!"

"That's good. It'll surely keep you busy for a while." He smiled.

"I hope you'll help me," she said. "How do you feel about furniture shopping...?"


	5. Chapter 5

Snow coated the back deck of Sam's new house. _My own house!_ she thought as she grabbed the broom and cleared the deck. Yep, the house was all hers! She grinned at the thought. The actual purchase and deed transfer had only required a couple of weeks, but the moving and settling in had taken a lot longer.

Getting her possessions from storage had been a project in itself. Granted she did not have a lot, mostly books and personal items, but they were scattered all over the country; some were in California, where her father presently resided; some in Virginia, where she had stored them while she was at the Pentagon; some down in Texas.

She'd taken her time decorating, and buying furniture—she wanted to be happy with her decisions for a long time. The interior walls of the house were all freshly painted a light cream when she first saw it, and she'd stayed with that, figuring it gave her lots of leeway for color choices. Beginning with the bedroom she'd picked for her own, she concentrated on one room at a time, choosing furniture, draperies, and accessories at a leisurely pace. The whole process had taken nearly four months, but now when she walked through the house, she was pleased with everything she saw.

So here it was, New Year's Eve, and everything was done—and tonight she was having a housewarming party! There was a big Christmas tree in the front room, glowing out through the picture window onto the snow; and another one, a convenient evergreen, with outdoor lights, on the side lawn. She'd been a bit lavish with holiday decorations, her first year in her own home, and already planning the party—so there were colored lights and greenery in every room, mistletoe in every doorway, candles in every window. Everything was perfect!

Janet and Cassie had helped with the decorating. Cassie had been fascinated with the whole idea of the Holiday Season, she'd only been on earth for two months and was excited to learn all she could about her new home. Having Cassie around was a joy; despite the horrible tragedy that had brought her to them, she was a loving, happy, outgoing girl. Sam was so glad Janet had decided to adopt the 12-year-old—she herself would have done it if the doctor hadn't, and she honestly wasn't sure she was ready for such a responsibility. But the role of doting aunt seemed tailor-made for her!

She glanced at the clock. 1730 hours. The caterers should be there in forty-five minutes, and guests would start arriving about 1930—that is, 7:30, she corrected herself. This wasn't a military event! She hoped she'd ordered enough food! She had invited a lot of people; SG-1, Janet and Cassie, General Hammond, the scientists who worked in her department, the members of the off duty SG teams, in fact she'd asked most of the off duty SGC personnel, and also her new neighbors for several houses in every direction. Probably seventy-five or eighty people altogether. A few had said they had plans, but most had accepted. This would be the first party she had attended since coming to Cheyenne Mountain, and she was looking forward to it. She glanced around one more time to make sure she hadn't forgotten anything, then headed upstairs to get ready.

As she showered she thought about the past four months of stargate missions. She felt as if she had acquitted herself pretty well. She hadn't made an idiot of herself even once, and the only real emotional breakdown had been when they thought Daniel had died on the water planet. Luckily they had found him, safe and well, and everyone had come home. The mission that had brought Cassie to them had been a close call, but they had gotten through it. And after that, she'd had Cassie _and _the house to keep her mind off of—well, never mind, she wasn't thinking about _that_ any more.

The invitations she sent out had said 'casual dress,' and she had picked out her own outfit a week ago; black velvet pants, a white silk overblouse cinched at the waist by a belt of gold links, black low-heeled sandals, dangly holiday earrings. She ran a comb through her hair; she'd had it cut shorter than usual a week or so ago, and she thought the pixie look was a nice change.

The doorbell rang and she ran downstairs to let in the caterer. The food truck was pulled to the very back of the driveway, and Sam let them in through the deck. The three servers who came with the food seemed to know exactly what they were doing, and quickly familiarized themselves with the layout of the house and Sam's preferences. After a short while, Sam left the kitchen to them.

The sun had set long ago, and Sam had turned on the porch lights, and all the outside colored lights—around the windows and on the tree and strung down the walkway from the front door. The colors were beautiful, glowing and reflecting on the snow. She checked to make sure the walks were still clear; it had snowed earlier in the day, but had stopped about mid-afternoon, and she had shoveled and swept away the snow.

At seven, the caterers started to set out trays of food—on the coffee- and side-tables in the front room, the small table in the front hall, in the dining area, on the desk in the library; drinks were arranged on the island in the kitchen, with a pleasant young man bartending.

At 7:10 the doorbell rang, and Sam went to greet her first guests. Daniel and Teal'c stood on the front porch, each with a bottle of wine decorated by a bow. Janet and Cassie arrived before she got the front door closed.

The guests arrived slowly at first—the bell rang every ten minutes or so. Around 8:30, things began to pick up, and the door opened and closed steadily for the next hour. It trickled off after that. Sam estimated that there were 60 people present by ten. The ground floor was filled with people and talk and laughter. Sam moved from one group to another, welcoming everyone, showing off her house if they were interested. She spent extra time with each of her new neighbors, getting to know them a bit better, introducing them to some of her Air Force friends.

The music was playing, and Sam had made sure that the furniture in her large front room could be easily pushed aside if anyone wanted to dance. Only a few couples did at first, but as the party progressed, and the drinks flowed, more and more people got into the act. One or two couples even danced out on the deck. Sam opened the sliding door partway so the music could be heard, and was ready to turn up the heat if it became chilly. However, with so many people in the house, it was not really a problem.

Sam was in constant demand on the dance floor, and actually had to excuse herself often in order to be a proper hostess. Around 11:30 she found herself dancing with Daniel to a slow oldie.

"I think you'll have to say your party is a big success, Sam," he said.

"Everybody does seem to be having a good time," she agreed, smiling. "And I'm so glad. It's good to see everyone here." She hugged him briefly. "I am really glad I bought this house, Daniel! It was the right thing to do!"

"Good. I love to see you happy, Sam."

Shortly before midnight, everyone gathered in the front room and glasses of champagne were passed around. _Auld Lang Syne_ was ready in the CD player. General Hammond led them in counting down the seconds until the New Year.

"Five! Four! Three! Two! One! HAPPY NEW YEAR!"

The music played! Everyone shouted, and toasted, and kissed! They threw streamers and balloons! There was even a bubble machine which Sam had bought because it had fascinated Cassie when they saw it in the store!

The reigning chaos dissolved into dancing, and drinking more champagne. Everybody was on the dance floor—it was nearly impossible to move! Sam could hardly tell who she was dancing with—one moment it was Colonel Reynolds, then Daniel, then her neighbor, a middle-aged man with a magnificent beard named Adam.

For another hour, the party continued in full swing. After that things began to wind down. A few people left. Then a few more. And then a large number almost all at once. Everyone hugged Sam and told her what a wonderful time they had and wished her much happiness in her new house.

At 2:17 a.m. Sam wished a good night to the last guests and thanked them for coming. She closed the door and stood for a minute with her back against it. It had been a wonderful evening; she had had a really great time, she thought with a smile.

She was not even disappointed that Colonel Jack O'Neill had never appeared!


	6. Chapter 6

**Sorry for such a long delay in posting. Busy time for us here; planning a wedding (not mine), gardens to prepare, yadda yadda! I do love Spring!**

**This chapter takes place during and after the episode Solitudes in Season 1. Substantial spoiler for that episode.**

**I hope you enjoy it, and thanks for reading!**

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

The Stargate shuddered, the vibrations loosening snow and chunks of ice down upon them. Sam ducked and covered her head. The chevrons glowed—and then shut down.

"It should have worked!" she cried, frustrated. "Why didn't it _work?!"_

"Captain..." The Colonel's voice was so weak she almost didn't hear. She scrambled down to where he lay, knelt at his side. "Captain... Plan B... Go..." he whispered.

"No, sir!" she protested. "I won't leave you!"

His voice was barely a breath. "Captain... I'm dying... Follow my...order. Please..."

"Sir..." She stared down at his face for a long moment. "Yes, sir," she got out finally. But she couldn't move. She was terrified; terrified that if she left him, he would die—but if she didn't go and seek help he would die anyway and it would be her fault for not doing everything she could to save him!

O'Neill's eyes opened, barely to slits, but she could see the warm brown depths, and her heart broke. "I... know, Sam. Tha's... why I'm... ordering you. _You _have to... live. Go..." His eyes closed as his words died. Her tears fell on his cheek, his mouth. She leaned down and touched her lips to his cold ones, feather light.

Then she rose, turned toward the slope, and began to climb. _Don't die. Don't die. Don't die._ She repeated the mantra in her head with each step, grinding her boots into the slippery surface to find one foothold after another, slipping back almost as often as she moved forward. _Don't die. Please don't die._ The light seemed to recede as she made slow progress upward. Halfway up she paused, looked back down where he lay. She thumbed the switch of her radio.

"Colonel. I can't see the surface yet—looks like it just keeps going up.."

"Sam..." his raspy voice, over the radio. "...was an honor...serving w...you..."

Rendered speechless, she choked, trying to reply. Cleared her throat. "Yes, sir..." was all she could manage.

Renewing her effort, she clawed her way higher, dug through a plug of snow and ice, and finally could see the light brighten above. She spoke into the radio again. "Almost there... I'll try to bring help, sir..."

There was no answer from below.

At last she hauled herself up, out of the passage, into the light. Into the open. She stumbled to her feet, straightened, and looked around.

Frozen desolation. Everywhere, in every direction. Nothing but ice.

She covered her mouth, sobbed once, choked it down and reached for the radio again. "_It's an ice planet, sir,"_she cried. "That's all there is! No chance..." her voice trailed off in another stifled sob.

Again there was no reply from the crevasse.

She stumbled down and leaned into the opening. "Colonel!" she screamed, into the silence below. She launched herself into the dark.

The slide back down took less than ten seconds, a tiny fraction of the time it had taken to gain the surface. She tumbled head over heels at the bottom. Ignoring the pain of cuts and bruises from the fall, she crawled back to his side, curled her body against him. If he was still breathing, she could not feel it; she cupped her hand on the icy skin of his cheek.

"Sara..." he breathed.

"I'm here, Jack," she answered without hesitation.

"Cold..."

"It's all right, Jack. You can sleep now." She felt his faint sigh of relief at her words. Moving closer, she put her arm around him, her head on his shoulder. "It was an honor serving with you, too, Colonel." She closed her eyes and felt the cold take her.

XXXXXXX

"Sam! Sam...!"

Daniel's voice?

"Sam, can you hear me?"

She forced her eyes open, saw his worried face bending over her.

"Daniel," she whispered. "You came for us." She reached a hand up toward him.

He caught her hand and held it tight in both of his. "Of course we did, Sam."

"The Colonel. He's hurt bad."

"We've got him. He's on the helicopter already. We're getting both of you out of here."

"Helicopter...?"

"We're taking her up now, Dr. Jackson," another voice said.

He laid her hand on a cold metal bar. "Hang on, Sam. They're bringing the stretcher up on a cable. I'll be back with you in just a few minutes."

She tried to nod, felt a swinging motion that made her dizzy.

XXXXXXX

"Antarctica?!" Sam stared at Daniel in disbelief. It had been nearly thirty-six hours since she was airlifted from the crevasse, and she was sitting up in her bed in the SGC infirmary. The trip home was a blur of changing images; Daniel's eyes, his hands holding hers; Teal'c and General Hammond looking on with concerned faces; Janet always nearby. She'd asked repeatedly about the Colonel, and had been assured over and over that he was going to be all right. Janet had kept her sedated for the flight home. She'd only been fully awake for a couple of hours. Unlike O'Neill, she had no serious injuries, but was dehydrated and suffering from hypothermia, mild shock and lack of nutrition. The cuts and bruises she had gotten coming through the gate and falling in the crevasse had been treated, and aside from some soreness, were not bothering her.

Daniel had just told her an incredible story of a second stargate here on Earth. "We were in _Antarctica_ all that time? How long before you found us?"

"Nearly four days."

"Felt like a month," she said. "So what are we doing about the second stargate?"

"It's been secured. I expect there'll have to be some high-level decisions made before it's relocated."

"Probably true." She reached for the glass of water on the side table, and Daniel got up and handed it to her. "Thanks, Daniel." She sipped through the straw. "Have you heard how the Colonel is doing today?"

He frowned. "I saw Dr. Fraiser on the way in here. She said they were taking him back into surgery a little while ago."

"Back? Why?"

"It seems the internal bleeding has started up again. They're working on him now."

"Can you go and check on him? Maybe there's some news..."

"She said she'd let us know as soon as he was out." Daniel paused a moment. "Jack's in pretty bad shape, Sam."

"I know. He came through the stargate much harder than I did. Broke his leg." She grimaced. "I hurt him a lot when I set it. And I'm pretty sure he has ribs broken."

He nodded. "Two broken, one cracked. And a concussion. Dr. Fraiser said the broken ribs, jabbing internally, caused the bleeding. Lucky it wasn't heavy—he'd have never survived four days if it had been."

"He wouldn't stay down, Daniel," she said, biting her lip. "He insisted on helping me dig for the DHD. That's probably when the bleeding started."

"They'll get the bleeding stopped, Sam. But there's something else."

She felt a stab of fear at his tone. "Something else..."

"He has pneumonia, Sam." Daniel heard her sharp intake of breath, but did not pause, wanting to get it all said. "And there's an infection in the broken leg. Janet hasn't found an antibiotic yet that helps."

She put a hand to her mouth. "I did everything I could think of, Daniel," she whispered. "None of it worked."

"Of course you did everything you could!" He was sad at the guilt he knew she felt, but not surprised. "Nobody thinks for a moment that you didn't!" He got up and went over to sit on the bed beside her and put his arm around her.

"I just feel like I should've been able to do more."

"Like what?" he asked logically. "The stargate wasn't going to work, no matter what you did. And you kept Jack alive until we found you. Sam, none of this is at all your fault."

"I know." She let her head rest on his shoulder. "It was just so hard not to be able to find a solution."

"Sometimes there _is_ no solution," he pointed out.

XXXXXXXX

Three days later, Colonel O'Neill's condition remained critical. The second surgery, though successful, revealed that there were several sources of bleeding, due to the broken ribs and the fact that he had not stayed immobile. It was fortunate that none of the punctures were severe, however the stress of the surgery also hindered the healing process. Dr. Fraiser had found a combination of antibiotics to fight the infection in his leg; but improvement was extremely slow. In addition, the pneumonia he developed from exposure was equally stubborn, and did not respond to the same antibiotic as his leg. His temperature continued to spike around 104. The combination of medications was starting to affect his kidneys, and could eventually cause permanent damage. would not allow any visitors.

Daniel, Teal'c, and Sam—once she was released from the infirmary—hung around the halls outside O'Neill's room so persistently, that Janet finally asked General Hammond to order them to stay away for at least twelve hours a day. Even then, there was always at least one of them nearby. Tonight, Teal'c had been sitting in the hallway all evening; Sam had joined him just a half hour ago.

Janet had taken to sleeping on the cot in her office. It was nearly midnight when she checked the Colonel for the last time and headed for some rest. She had stopped to talk to Sam and Teal'c on her way out of O'Neill's room, trying, however fruitlessly, to get them to go and get some sleep. In the office, she sat down and slipped her shoes off, reaching down to rub her feet.

At that moment the code blue alarms shrieked through the infirmary.

Sam and Teal'c watched in horror has the medical staff converged on Colonel O'Neill's room. Dr. Fraiser ran past them in stocking feet. Sam hardly knew that she started forward until Teal'c's hand stopped her.

"You cannot help, CaptainCarter. Let them do their work."

She nodded and backed off, but strained to see and hear through the open door. The various shouted medical orders were garbled in her ears, but she clearly heard the call of "Clear!" and then the electrical snap of the defibrillator. When she gasped and placed a hand over her mouth, Teal's put his arm around her shoulders.

There was a momentary pause in activity, and then Janet's voice. "Got it. Sinus rhythm." Someone moved over and closed the door at that point, and Sam and Teal'c turned to each other in combined relief and frustration.

It was a while before Janet emerged from O'Neill's room. By then, Sam had called Daniel and he had joined her and Teal'c in the hallway. She took one look at the strained faces of the Colonel's teammates and motioned them to follow her.

"Come to my office," she said. "I need to sit before I fall down—and you guys don't look much better."

In her office, Janet sat in her desk chair with a sigh. Daniel and Sam perched on the edge of the cot and Teal'c lowered himself into the visitor's chair. The three waited for Janet to speak.

"Colonel O'Neill just experienced an episode of V-fib—ventricular fibrillation—which responded immediately to the defibrillator. His heart rhythm is good now." Janet rubbed her eyes, and went on. "Medications like those the colonel is taking can cause imbalances in the body's chemistry, in this case, potassium and sodium levels. I think this is what caused the episode. We're testing right now to find out for sure. He's being placed temporarily on an external pacemaker-defibrillator, until I get the test results. I should be able to compensate for the imbalance with meds. If not, then we can leave the device in place for as long as necessary." ******

"So he's as okay as he can get for the moment?" Daniel asked.

She nodded. "That's about it."

"Has there been any other progress in O'Neill's recovery?" Teal'c asked.

"Today's chest scans showed some improvement. The infection in his leg—it isn't getting any worse, at the moment."

It was small comfort, but better than nothing. After a few minutes they left Janet's office to allow her to get some sleep.

XXXXXXXX

It was eight days after they were rescued from Antarctica before Janet felt that O'Neill was actually making some progress. The infection in his leg was finally getting under control. Although he was still unconscious, his fever was down, and scans showed that the pneumonia was slowly but surely retreating.

"Can we see him?" Sam asked. "I mean, can I just go sit with him for a while."

Janet studied her for a minute. Sam had been as nervous as the proverbial cat ever since she and the Colonel had been rescued from Antarctica, and by now was so pale and drawn that Fraiser had threatened more than once to have her confined to the infirmary. Maybe sitting with him would do her good. "Just one of you at a time," she said. "And don't stay too long." She doubted if Sam even heard that last, she was already halfway down the corridor. Janet turned to Daniel and Teal'c. "For her own good, she shouldn't stay in there indefinitely. She's not a hundred percent yet herself."

"We'll watch out for her," Daniel promised.

"Indeed we will," Teal'c added.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

Thirty hours later O'Neill woke up calling Sam's name. Daniel was sitting in a chair beside the bed, reading one of his archeology books, when he was startled to his feet by Jack's weak cry;

"Carter... I told you... Go!"

Daniel went to the bedside, to find Jack's eyes open, his body tensed as if trying to rise. "Hey, take it easy, Jack." He reached over and pressed the call button. "It's okay. You're in the infirmary."

"Carter," the Colonel repeated. "I told you to go!"

Daniel put his hand on Jack's shoulder. "Sam is fine, Jack. I'll get her in just a few minutes."

Janet entered the room then and came to the bedside.

"Sam..." Jack muttered. His eyes were closing again.

"I'll go find her," Daniel said. He glanced at Janet; she nodded and then turned to the Colonel.

Any other time Sam would have been hovering around Jack's door, Daniel thought, finding her lab empty. He picked up the phone on her desk and started checking likely locations, finally locating her in the commissary. She was already in the infirmary by the time he got back there. The door to Jack's room was closed, and through the window they could see Janet and a nurse in with him.

"Daniel?" she asked.

"He woke up just a few minutes ago, calling you." He repeated what Jack had said.

They waited impatiently for Janet to emerge. When she did, she looked cautiously relieved. "He's awake—and responsive. He answered my standard questions. His fever is down to about 100 right now, which is the best it's been. I'm ordering new scans shortly. But you can go in for a few minutes. He seems really concerned about you, Sam."

"Thanks, Janet."

Sam opened the door and stepped inside. O'Neill's eyes were closed. She hesitated for an instant, and then approached the bed quietly.

He knew it when she entered the room; the soft footsteps crossing the floor could have been anyone, but he knew in his soul that it was her. He opened his eyes and turned his gaze toward her, finding her face, feeling a great relief that she was all right. "Carter... Did you go? Like I... told you..."

"I tried, sir. There was nothing but ice and snow up there. So I came back."

"They... found us," he murmured. "How...?"

"Long story, sir. It can wait until you feel better." Hesitantly, she laid a hand on his arm. "It's good to have you back, sir."

His eyes drifted shut. She stood there for several minutes, with her fingers resting on his arm, feeling the heat of his skin, watching him breathe, and allowing herself to be thankful he was alive. Tears threatened, but she held them back. _I love you, sir. _She squeezed his arm lightly and started to turn aside as she heard the door open behind her.

Her skin was cool against his. "Carter..." His hand moved, caught hold of her fingers.

"Yes, sir?"

"I know... what I did to you... when I made you leave me." His voice was barely above a whisper, and she leaned closer to hear. He saw blue eyes, shiny with tears unshed, looking down at him. "I'm... sorry..." he murmured. Her self-control broke a little, and for the second time in his memory, he felt her warm tears on his face. His lips trembled in the very ghost of a smile. "Thank you... for saving my life..."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

****(A/N – Janet's explanation paragraph is pretty much gobbeldy-gook! I have no medical training, therefore, no real idea what I'm talking about. Sounds as good as some of the stuff they spout on TV, though :-) Please be forgiving.)**


	7. Chapter 7

**My apologies for the long wait between updates. Summer is a busy time, and there's so much to do outdoors. I love the long daylight, but it doesn't leave many hours for writing. Please don't be too tough on me :)**

**This chapter turned out to be very long, so I'm breaking it into three parts, and posting them over the next few days. **

**A broken leg, plus the other injuries which Jack sustained in the episode Solitudes, would have sidelined him for at least ten weeks, and probably more like 3 or more months. I think it's reasonable to expect that the other SG-1 members were assigned to other teams on an as-needed basis during that time. This chapter takes place while Jack is recovering from his injuries in Solitudes and assumes a considerable length of time between Solitudes and the next episode, Tin Man.**

**Spoiler for Solitudes.**

**XXXXXXXXXX**

**Part 1 **

Pain, exhaustion and boredom. Those were the words that best described Colonel Jack O'Neill's life for the three weeks since he regained consciousness after the Antarctica 'adventure.' It had taken most of that time for Dr. Fraiser to be satisfied that the infection in his leg was under control; and nearly as long for his chest scans to come back clear of pneumonia. Four days ago, she had finally released him from the infirmary, but only after he agreed to stay on base, and check in with her every day. Since he could not manage at home on his own yet, and his team members were being parceled out to other teams, and therefore not readily available to help him, he really had no choice but to agree.

At first he was thrilled with the mobility that a wheelchair and crutches gave him—but then he was banned from the gate room because he wouldn't be able to move fast enough in an emergency, and he couldn't get to the control room easily because it was only accessible by stairs; in addition, the conference room was in use constantly with briefings and debriefings of SG teams, so he couldn't crash there. That left his office, the officers' lounge which was generally deserted, and the cafeteria where he could go and just hang out; or he could visit Daniel, Carter or Teal'c—if he could catch them on base! He might drop in on General Hammond now and then, but the General was a busy man, and seldom had time for casual chat.

Also, he discovered quickly that he was seriously lacking in stamina—even the effort of moving the wheelchair tired him after a short time. He found himself in need of frequent sleep.

"You've had pneumonia, Colonel," Janet pointed out, when he whined about the exhaustion. "The infection is cured, but the recovery is another matter. And if you push it, you'll just end up back in the infirmary. God forbid!" she added prayerfully.

"You really know how to make a guy feel wanted, Doc," he griped.

Furniture on base was notoriously uncomfortable, so he somehow finagled a recliner for his quarters, and a comfy sofa and a TV set for the officer's lounge. That room became instantly more popular! He talked Daniel and Teal'c into bringing a bunch of items from his house—including his gameboy, DVD/CD player and favorite discs, pillows, comfortable clothes, interesting magazines... suffice to say, it was a long list.

General Hammond did draw the line at Jack's request for a small fridge in his quarters and a supply of his favorite beer, however, and Janet just about had a fit when she heard that one. Someone commented that having an injured and bored O'Neill on base was sort of like being back in high school when the star quarterback broke his ankle. Hammond actually rolled his eyes at that. It took a lot to make the General roll his eyes.

Carter was noticeably absent from the Mountain. Jack was disappointed at that. He'd kind of wanted to explore the after-effect of the enforced closeness they had experienced on the glacier—they hadn't talked about it except for those brief words when he first regained consciousness—or if that didn't prove interesting, it was always nice just to have her there to feast his eyes on several times a day and to tease a bit. He asked around a little, and discovered that she was taking Combat Casualty Care Training at the Academy Medical Center.

"She had the EMT courses several years ago—this is a refresher," Daniel told him. "She thinks she should have been able to do more for you when you were injured."

"She kept me alive! What the hell else could she have done for me?" Jack demanded.

"That's what I asked her," Daniel said ruefully. "She says she wants to be ready in case something like this happens to any of the team again. She feels guilty for not knowing how to fix it all."

"Some things can't be fixed," Jack said, for once neither joking nor sarcastic.

"Don't try to tell Sam that," Daniel advised, hauling his backpack out from under his lab desk.

"She's like you," Jack said. "You both think you're responsible for the world."

"I do not," Daniel protested.

"Do too."

"Do not."

"Do too."

Daniel surrendered with a glare, just as Jack knew he would.

Jack accepted the victory with a grin, and changed the subject. "I haven't seen Teal'c lately, either. Any idea where he is?"

"He's off with SG-19 doing recon on P4Y-something or other. Seems it may be one of Apophis' more remote holdings."

"Oh. Okay. So... what about you? What are you doing today?"

"I'm heading out in an hour with SG-8. There's some ancient Egypt-like ruins on P8X-214. I'm going to have a look." Daniel was loading books into his backpack.

"Jeez," Jack whimpered. "I might as well do paperwork."

"Sounds like a plan," Daniel agreed absently, clearly more interested in his upcoming jaunt than in Jack's boredom.

Actually, Jack didn't even have paperwork to do. Carter had caught it all up for him in the past few weeks. Sighing, he slowly turned his wheelchair around to leave. "Have a good trip, Danny boy."

"Thanks, Jack. See you in a couple of days."

Jack raised a hand without turning back.

Daniel paused for a minute, watching him go, not buying his pathetic act for a moment; instead he was thinking about what Sam had confessed to him before she left for the Academy.

"_I have to get away from the Colonel for a while, Daniel. I gotta pull myself together somehow, and I can't do it if I see him everywhere I turn." She sat down in the chair in Daniel's office and sighed. "I thought I'd gotten over it, really I did. It was just a crush... But when I thought we were both going to die there together... I guess I let my feelings... I let myself admit how I feel. We were so close for those days under the ice. And I was terrified that he was going to die any minute. Then all through this last month, worrying about him, seeing him like that every day, wondering if he was going to be all right... I've just got to get away from him for a while! Or else I won't be able to function around him." She looked up at Daniel with distress. "I thought I had it under control, Daniel, but when I thought he was going to die, I knew I'll love him forever!" She blushed furiously. "I know that sounds waay too dramatic..."_

"_Not really." He had paused a moment with a faraway look. "The first time Sha're kissed me... even before that, when she called me Dan-yel... I knew she was the one for me. I just knew."_

Daniel shook himself, and shoved his journal into the pack. He was really looking forward to seeing this pyramid!

**o0o**

Sam slipped into her seat in the Med Center lecture hall. This was the fourth day of CCC training and so far it was a repeat of what she'd learned six years earlier. Not that it hurt to review this stuff—six years was a long time. She was pleased to be able to say she recalled nearly all of it. Mostly she was looking forward to the practicum, however—simulated battlefield training. Of the eight week course, six were scheduled to be in the field.

Her cell phone vibrated in her pocket. She took it out and looked at the caller ID. O'Neill? Why would the Colonel be calling her? She ignored it and shoved the phone back in her pocket.

The course instructor, Colonel Mallory, was walking down the aisle toward the front of the room.

Sam's text alert chimed. Frowning, she took the phone out again.

He had written: _Ans yr phn! Thts n ordr! _She stared at the message in bewilderment. Twenty seconds later, the phone vibrated again.

She rose from her seat, and stepped into the aisle, turning to leave the room.

"Captain Carter?" Col. Mallory's voice made her pause.

"Sorry, sir." She held up the phone. "My CO."

Mallory nodded, but did not look happy.

Sam hurried up the aisle toward the door, pressing the talk button and putting the phone to her ear. "Yes, sir."

"Carter, I need you back here ASAP," the Colonel said.

All her senses went on alert at his tone. "What's happened, sir?"

"Daniel's missing."

**o0o**

Lieutenant Melissa Stark hated the dark. Not that she was afraid; it was just that when she couldn't see what was out there, she couldn't prepare herself for it. She'd awakened a while ago, in pitch blackness, with a headache. In fact, most of her body ached, and she was stiff and sore. She had tried her radio, which was attached to her vest shoulder, and heard nothing but static in response.

_What the hell happened, _she wondered for the hundredth time. One moment she was standing there, watching Dr. Jackson as he examined the rune-like markings he had uncovered in an alcove of the pyramid on P8X-214—and the next, she was waking up on the hard ground, in the dark, with no idea how she'd gotten there or how much time had passed.

She was able to figure out that she was in a cave of some sort. Not too large—there was something about the feel of the space, and the way her voice sounded when she called out which told her that much. She'd walked carefully around the perimeter, trailing her hand along the wall as she went. The space was roughly rectangular, with no exits, and she thought it was about forty by sixty feet. Counting slowly as she walked, she knew she'd reached the place where she started when her foot touched her weapon, which she had laid at right angles to the wall. It had taken less than ten minutes to circle the space. She hadn't explored the interior area yet.

Mel cursed herself for setting her pack on the ground; at one point she had squatted down to get a closer look at what Dr. Jackson was studying, and it had been uncomfortable in that position, jabbing into her hipbone. Jackson was explaining what he was doing, and it was pretty interesting as far as she could understand it. Anyway, the pack—with her emergency light in it!—was still (she assumed) on the floor of the pyramid room, where it was doing her absolutely no good!

Her team would have missed her by now. They'd been gone for an hour and a half before this happened; they should have returned to the pyramid. She tried the radio again. Still nothing except static.

Sitting down with her back against the wall, Mel concentrated on remembering what had happened just before she ended up here. Dr. Jackson had dug away some debris and uncovered a stone slab set upright into a relatively undamaged section of the wall. The slab was covered with glyphs, and he had leaned in to study them. There had been no need for lights, since there was a large hole above them where the roof had collapsed, and the late morning sun poured into the passage. Jackson seemed rather excited about what he was seeing, and had been talking to her, trying to explain it.

"I think there's another passage beyond this wall," he explained. "And the symbols are a code for opening the door. Get them in the right order and the wall slides away. Of course it probably won't work with all this structural damage anyway, but it's fascinating to try and solve it..."

Mel turned her thoughts away from what Jackson had been saying, and pictured the area where they had been standing, letting her photographic memory search for any clue to what was about to happen. He had been examining the upper part of the stele, his left hand braced for balance, his right outstretched, as if he were about to touch one of the symbols... in fact, he _had_ touched it, had pressed it and the stone tile it was set into had moved slightly, and then... what? She rewound her memory; he had reached over, while he was talking, and touched more than one of the symbols... and then the final one, at the top—he'd had to stretch up to reach it. That was the last thing she recalled before waking up here.

So... what? He had hit upon the sequence and it had caused _this_ to happen? And what exactly was _this?_ Or maybe the two things weren't related at all? He'd said the puzzle was for opening a door. No opening door had caused this. Who or what had brought her here?

Mel rubbed a hand across her eyes. Where was Dr. Jackson? Wasn't it logical that he would be somewhere nearby? It was time to start exploring the interior of the cave.

**o0o**

Sam made it back to the Mountain in record time.

When she reached the briefing room, the Colonel was seated at the table, crutches on the floor behind him. General Hammond was there, along with Lt. Colonel Espy, CO of SG-8, and two other team members, Lieutenant Wade and Captain Toben. Through the glass window into the gate room Sam saw that Teal'c had arrived, and a few moments later he came up the stairs.

She went over to O'Neill. "Sir, what's happened to Daniel?"

There was a paper on the table in front of him; he slid it toward her. She sat down beside him and looked at it. It had Espy's signature at the bottom. It was a half page report on their mission.

She read it quickly. Teal'c had come around the table to read over her shoulder.

SG-8 - Mission to P8X-214.

Personnel; Lt. Col. R. Espy, Capt. E. Toben, Lt. M. Stark, Lt. R. Wade, Dr. D Jackson science consult.

SG8 arrived on planet at 0900hr. Observed no inhabitants. Proceeded one Km NNW to location of pyramid ruins, arriving 0915. Dr. Jackson, Lt Stark remained there to study Egyptian writings. Capt. Toben, Lt. Wade and I continued NNW for additional five K to survey territory. Nothing of note observed. Turned back at 1040hr, and returned to pyramid, arriving at 1225 hr. Found no trace of Stark or Jackson. Toben, Wade, and I executed standard search of the immediate area, with no results. At 1300 hr, we dialed the gate and reported in. We were ordered to extend our search perimeter, which we did and rendezvoused at the pyramid at 1410. Still no sign of Stark, Jackson or anyone else. We then dialed the gate and reported and were ordered back to the SGC.

Signed

Rowan Espy, CO, SG8

Sam glanced down at her watch; it was 1455. They had been missing more than two hours, and perhaps as long as six. "No sign of him... them?" she asked. "Search teams deployed, sir?"

"SG-11 and 17 are there now, Carter," O'Neill told her. "They're reporting in at half hour intervals. So far, nothing."

"All right, people," General Hammond announced. "Have a seat and we'll get started." He took the head of the table.

They sat, O'Neill, Sam and Teal'c on one side of the table, Lt. Colonel Espy, Captain Toben and Lieutenant Wade facing them.

Hammond turned to SG8's leader. "Col. Espy, we've all read the brief report you submitted. What else can you add that might help us in the search?"

"I'm afraid there isn't much, sir." Espy was a dark eyed, hard-faced man in his late thirties. "On our recon to P8X-214 two days ago, we found very little indication that the area around the gate has been occupied at any time in the recent past; there were no established paths in the forest, for example, and only one or two badly deteriorated structures in the vicinity of the pyramid ruins."

"Did you explore the pyramid, Colonel?" O'Neill asked.

"Only superficially, sir. We saw that there was some kind of writing on the inner walls. It was only possible to enter for about ten meters; a collapse of the structure has blocked the passage from there on."

"Could there have been another collapse that trapped Daniel and Lt. Stark, sir?" Sam asked.

"No, Captain. The inside of the passage was the same as the first time we entered it. Some of Dr. Jackson's tools and Lt. Stark's backpack were on the ground where Jackson had been working."

"If they were going to search another part of the pyramid, Daniel would have likely taken his tools, sir," Carter said, glancing at General Hammond and then at O'Neill.

"Which is why we thought they may have been attacked and taken prisoner," Espy confirmed. "But there were no signs of a struggle. And the only tracks were the ones we had made going and coming."

"SG-11 and 17 have reported in twice," Hammond said. "So far they've found nothing."

"General Hammond," Teal'c spoke up. "I would like permission to join the teams and assist in the search for Daniel Jackson."

"So would I, sir," Sam added.

"Teal'c, permission granted. Captain Carter, I have something else for you."

"Sir?"

The General glanced at Jack and then back at her. "Colonel O'Neill has made a strong argument to have himself put in charge of coordinating the search from the SGC. I've agreed, on the condition that you will share that responsibility with him. Considering his state of recovery, I believe it would be too much to expect him to handle it alone." He gave a stern glance as Jack made a face. "Also I will have to have Dr. Fraiser's approval—and I don't see her giving it unless someone backs the Colonel up. She may not give it anyway—in which case I would put you in charge of this end of the operation."

"Sir, I'm perfectly capable..." Jack began.

"I'm not the one you have to convince, Jack," Hammond interrupted. "Talk to Fraiser." He looked back at Sam. "Captain?"

"Yes, sir. Understood."

**o0o**

"It's going to be mostly on you, Sam," Janet told her, half an hour later, after she had checked Jack over. "At this point he can't make it through a morning without needing to sleep for two or three hours."

"I know. I'll do all of the work."

"And the stress might be too much," Janet added.

"He'd be even more stressed if he isn't involved," Sam pointed out.

"That's possible. But you'll have to keep a close eye on him; make sure he rests and takes his meds."

"Hey!" the subject of their discussion spoke up in irritation. "_He'_s sitting right here, ladies!"

Janet put a hand to her ear. "Do I hear comments from the peanut gallery?"

Sam smiled for the first time since she'd heard Daniel was missing. Jack growled in his throat. "Women! Always tryin' to run things..."

"Especially when we have MD after our names," Fraiser agreed smugly. "All right, Colonel, I'll approve this as long as you let Captain Carter carry the load. Do you understand?"

He screwed up his face in a frown, but reluctantly nodded his head.

**o0o**


	8. Chapter 7 Part 2

**Chapter 7, Part 2 **

The hours passed and the search and rescue teams' reports were all the same, there was no sign of Daniel and Lt. Stark. Teal'c and SG-5 had gone through the gate some time ago to assist in the search.

O'Neill and Carter set up a space to work from. Sam convinced him to use the officers' lounge, since he could be more comfortable there than in an office. Siler rounded up a large table for them, and Sam set up her computer. By the time they were organized she could tell that the Colonel was in pain. It turned out he had skipped his last meds.

"They make me groggy, Carter," he snarled, when she brought them to him with a glass of water.

"You can't skip them, sir. Janet will put you back in the infirmary, and off this job."

"Crap, Carter," he said, taking the pills from her and tossing them down all at once. "I feel incredibly useless. I can't believe how tired I get." He had not stopped to rest since he had heard that Daniel was missing, and was really dragging.

"Lie down for a bit, sir," she urged. "If you sleep, all the better. The teams won't report in again for another three quarters of an hour. I'll wake you if there's any news."

He let her persuade him. His leg was aching badly, and needed to be elevated. The tiredness reached down into his core, and he could feel his heart pounding. She found a pillow for his head and one to put under his leg, and went looking for a blanket. She got one from her quarters, and returned to find him already sleeping. Turning down the lights, she spread the blanket over him, and watched him for a few minutes. He was restless, making little jerky movements, and breathing too fast. She went back to her computer, and continued setting up the S&R schedule that they had been working on, but found herself looking over at him way too frequently.

_So much for her plan to stay away from him for a while. Her feelings were all tied up in knots—worrying about Daniel, and having to look out for the Colonel ..._ _She kept thinking about the ice cave... and the things she had said to him... things she had no business admitting. He had been delirious, and probably hadn't understood her anyway; she'd been certain he was going to die—and she couldn't let that happen without telling him how she felt about him, at least this once. Oh, God! But what if he remembered?! _

**o0o**

Mel found Dr. Jackson on her third slow passage into the interior of the cave. With nothing to orient herself by, she made the journey on her hands and knees, feeling for solid ground as she went, and relying on instinct to keep her crossing as straight as possible. On her first lap, she ran into a roadblock—a large rectangular stone mass; when she stood, it came to chest height. She worked her way around it, and continued in what she hoped was the same direction until she encountered a wall. Then she moved four paces to her right, got down again and repeated the process. There were no more blockades, but her progress was slow. Meeting the wall once more, she again reversed herself and continued.

A short distance into the void, her hand touched a body. A quick examination told her it was Dr. Jackson. He was lying on his side. She felt for his head and throat, and was relieved to find the pulse there, fast but steady. There was a sticky substance on his face, which she assumed was blood. She shook him gently and called his name. He groaned faintly, but made no further response. _Well, at least he was alive!_

As she continued to examine him carefully, she realized he was wearing his backpack! Relief flooded her. The presence of the pack meant a light, his canteen, and possibly even a first aid kit! She tore into the pockets, searching first for the light and found it in the third pocket.

Switching the light on brought tears to her eyes, and Mel angled the beam away to allow them to adjust. When she could see, she turned the light to look at Dr. Jackson. The left side of his head was covered with blood, and his hair was matted with it. There was a considerable amount of blood on the ground under his head. She carefully removed his pack and eased him onto his back. The wound was about two inches above and behind his ear, and she examined it gingerly. The bleeding had stopped, and she was careful not to disturb it. He had bled quite a bit, and she didn't want to start it up again. An irregular shaped, softball size rock covered with blood, beneath where his head had laid, seemed the most likely cause of his injury.

She turned to checking out the contents of his pack. She found books and a couple of tools—a small hammer and chisel—that she had seen him use. In the side pocket was his canteen, almost full of water. She took a couple of sips, and then closed it tightly. His radio was shoved into the pack; she ignored it for now, since she'd received no reply on hers. There were several energy bars and four MRE packages and another flashlight. There was a small bottle of something very strong smelling—some kind of solvent, she thought, maybe for cleaning artifacts. She screwed the cap back on firmly. He had brought along two pair of clean socks. And an inhaler. A plastic bag held folded rags. She found a pair of leather gloves and a rolled up boonie. A second metal water bottle was shoved down in the bottom of the pack. And at last she unearthed a well-stocked first aid kit.

**o0o**

Teal'c and the S&R teams had been searching an ever-widening area around the pyramid ruins for several hours with no results. Not only was there no sign of Daniel Jackson or Lt. Melissa Stark, there was no evidence that anyone other than the searchers had been in the area for quite a long time.

It was very late afternoon and he and Captain Toben were approaching the ruins on the backswing of their search pattern. Teal'c studied the structure. It had been impressive in its day. It was approximately 60 meters in height, with a base about 90 meters on a side. It was not a Goa'uld design. Those were smooth-sided, built to accommodate a mother ship. This was a step-pyramid, and probably had had a flat top, though it had been badly damaged by the passage of time. He wondered about the interior.

He turned to his companion. "CaptainToben, I should like to see the place where you found DanielJackson's tools."

"They were in the passage that he was exploring," Toben explained. "We brought them back to the SGC with us."

"I know. I should like to see the location where he was working."

"Sure. This way." Toben led the way around to an adjoining side of the base, and approximately one third of the distance from the corner, where there was an entrance. The pyramids walls around and above the entrance were partially collapsed. The passage was now deep in shadow, so both men took out their high intensity hand lights. A few meters inside, the passage angled to the right, and shortly widened out into what was left of a moderate sized room. The pyramid wall above had collapsed, filling part of the space with debris, and opening the ceiling to the sky.

Toben pointed to a small alcove straight ahead. "Over there. Stark's pack was lying on the right, and Dr. Jackson's tools, and one of his books, were on the floor close to the wall."

Teal'c crossed to the alcove and studied the wall; after a few moments, he trained his light across the face of the stones. "There are symbols here."

"Yes. Dr. Jackson was hoping to determine what they meant."

"Did he mention whether he was making any progress?"

"Not to me," Toben replied. "Maybe to Col. Espy."

"How long was Daniel in the pyramid?"

"He went in as soon as we got here—about 0940 hours. When we got back from checking out the area at 1205, he and Lt. Stark were gone."

Teal'c passed his hand up across the symbols. "I shall require a camera."

"Video or still?" Toben asked, digging into his pack. He produced a compact unit. "This is a still. The Colonel would be carrying our video cam."

"This will suffice." Teal'c spent twenty minutes taking meticulous photographs of every inch of the alcove, watched by a bemused Toben.

**o0o**

It was a long time before Dr. Jackson woke. Mel spent some of the time exploring the cave with the light, but other than the dozen or so rectangular stone blocks, she found nothing that seemed helpful. She tried the radio again at intervals, but still heard only static. Not wanting to exhaust the batteries, she turned off the flashlight and stretched out on the ground beside Jackson.

When he finally groaned and tried to roll over, Mel reached over to soothe him.

"Ow..." He tried to push her hand away. "Hurts..."

"I'm sorry, Dr. Jackson. You have a nasty head wound. You should probably lie still." Sitting up, she switched on the light and turned it away from him.

"What?" He was confused and tried to see her. The light was awful. "Lt. Stark?"

"Yes, sir."

"What happened...?"

"I'm not really sure, sir. You were explaining about the symbols you found on the pyramid wall. And the next thing I knew I was waking up here."

He put up his hand gingerly to his own head. "Ouch! What hit me?"

"I think you fell on a rock. I'm pretty sure you have a concussion. You need to lie still for a while," she repeated when he tried to move. "Do you want some water?"

"Yeah..."

She uncapped the water bottle and helped him to drink. "Thanks," he said. "Where are we? Is it nighttime?"

"We're in a cave—or something. No natural light at all." She shined the flashlight around the walls. "I didn't have light until I found you. I didn't want to waste the batteries, but I looked around a bit. There's no exit from this room."

He squinted blearily at the walls. "Are my glasses here somewhere?"

She searched around him, and found them a few feet away. "I think they're okay," she said as she handed them to him.

He put them on, then removed them again and scrubbed at the lenses with his sleeve. "Not sure that helps," he said. "How long have we been here?"

"I don't know exactly, Doctor. Several hours. Until I found you, about 1400, I didn't know the time. I woke up maybe an hour before that." She glanced at her wristwatch. "It's now 1754."

"Can I have some more of that water?"

"Of course, Dr. Jackson." She helped him with the water, and then he lay back down and closed his eyes.

**o0o**

Sam allowed Jack to sleep through the next check-in by the S&R teams, knowing he would be annoyed with her when he found out—but, since nothing had changed, she also knew there was nothing he could do. She woke him shortly before the second check-in was due.

Predictably, he was grouchy. "Why'd you let me sleep so long, Carter?" He complained, rubbing his eyes and struggling to sit up on the sofa.

"Because there's no news, sir, and it was only an hour and a half," she replied. "The teams haven't found anything. I've spent most of the time catching up on my own work. There's nothing either one of us can do at the moment."

"When's the next report due?"

"In just a little while. But you know they'd have called in earlier, if they found anything."

"Yeah, I know." He sighed. "I don't suppose there's any chance of some coffee?"

She grinned. "I called the cafeteria ten minutes ago and asked for some to be sent down. It should be here shortly."

A few minutes later an airman brought the coffee along with sandwiches, and two slices of chocolate cake. It made Sam smile to see Jack's eyes light up.

"Mmmm!" he said. "My favorite, chocolate with chocolate frosting."

"I know. You talked about it in Antarctica, when our food ran out."

He looked up at her. "I did, didn't I? And _you_ talked about... fixing the DHD?! Naturally!" She rolled her eyes at him. "So, what's _your_ favorite dessert, Carter? And don't say blue jello!"

"Cherry pie," she admitted. "My aunt used to make a cherry pie that was to die for. Warm. With vanilla ice cream."

"That sounds good, too. Maybe I'll try that sometime."

The warning sirens sounded just then. "Off world activation!"

Sam glanced at her watch. "They're a couple minutes early."

"Well, let's go find out if there's any news." Jack heaved himself off the sofa and she handed him his crutches.

Because the elevator was right outside the lounge door, they made it to the control room just as Teal'c was handing off his gear to a waiting airman. He came quickly up the stairs to join them.

"Did you find something, T?" Jack demanded.

"I am afraid we did not, O'Neill. However, I have taken pictures of the wall writings that DanielJackson was studying before he disappeared." He held up the memory card from the camera. "I do not know if they are significant or not. Captain Toben told me that one of Daniel's books was found on the ground with his tools. He said they brought it back to the SGC. Perhaps we should look at that book."

It took a while to identify and locate the person who had accepted Daniel's tools and book from SG-8. In the meantime, Sam downloaded Teal'c's pictures onto her computer, and then printed them. They spread them out on the table in the lounge and the three of them studied the pictures one by one.

"What did you see there that made you want to take these, Teal'c?" Sam asked after a while.

"This language is one I have seen before. It is not a form of Goa'uld; I think it is much older. It was found on some of the worlds the system lords captured." He pointed to one symbol. "This means _puzzle,_" he said. "And this, e_ntrance._" He tapped another. "The rest of the symbols are unknown to me. These two were located side by side."

Sam frowned. "Okay. So they were meant to be read together," she guessed. "What does that mean? The entrance to a puzzle—or maybe a maze?"

"I do not know. That is why I wish to see DanielJackson's book. Perhaps there is a clue there." He glanced from Sam to Jack. "We have searched the area around the pyramid for several kilometers in every direction, and have found no sign of DanielJackson or Lt. Stark. In fact, we found no sign that anyone, other than ourselves, has been in the area for a very long time. There were no tracks that were not made by SG teams. No signs of campsites or habitation. I do not believe that they walked or were carried away."

Sam watched Jack's expression grow more and more grim as Teal'c talked. "What are you suggesting, T?" he asked. "That someone spirited them away?"

"I do not know, O'Neill."

"Is there a ring platform there?" Sam asked.

Teal'c shook his head. "There is not."

Just then a young airman arrived at the door of the lounge; he came to attention and saluted. "Sirs! Senior Airman Nelson, sirs. I was told to report here, and tell you that I took Dr. Jackson's belongings to his office after SG-9 arrived back through the gate."

"At ease, Airman," Jack told him. "We've got a couple of questions." He waved at Teal'c.

"Airman Nelson, I understand there was a book among DanielJackson's things. Is that correct?"

"Yes, sir."

"Please accompany me to Daniel's office and show me this book." Teal'c strode out the door with Nelson hurrying to catch up.

**o0o**

When Daniel opened his eyes again the cave was pitch black.

"Are you there?" he asked into the darkness.

"I'm here." She sounded further away than before, and he could hear her moving. A moment later, the flashlight came on, carefully pointed away from him. She was seated a few feet away.

"I must have dozed," he said. "What time is it now?"

She extended her arm under the light beam. "It's 1845 hours. How does your head feel, Dr. Jackson."

"Pounding."

"There's morphine in the first aid kit," she said. "Do you want some, sir?"

"No. I'd take a couple of aspirin, though."

She moved over to the pack and took out the kit. A minute later she handed him two pills, then helped him sit up to take them.

"Daniel," he said.

"What?"

"Call me Daniel."

"Okay. Daniel. I'm Mel."

"Mel. For...?"

"Melissa. I can't stand the name."

He smiled. "I liked a girl named Melissa once. She went by Lissa."

She snorted. "Now that's really silly. I'll bet she was cute and blonde and girly."

"Yeh," he admitted. "Except her hair was red."

After a while, Daniel's head began to feel a bit better, and he was able to sit up. His curiosity regarding their situation asserted itself, and he questioned Mel, getting her to tell him everything she remembered.

He took the flashlight, and shined it on the walls, carefully studying the space around them, moving the light about slowly. When it reached the first rectangular stone mass, he stopped. "That's a sarcophagus. The tomb kind. Not the Goa'uld kind." He moved the light further, and located the others. "Are there any markings on the stone covers?" he asked.

She shook her head. "No. And I looked pretty carefully. I thought there might be."

He shined the light on the walls and the ceiling for what seemed a long time, frowning. "Mel, we're not in a cave," he said finally. "Those walls are made of blocks. We're inside the pyramid."

**o0o**


	9. Chapter 9

**I'm sorry this third part of Chapter 7 took so much time to get posted. It just seemed to get longer and longer...**

**Chapter 7, Part 3 **

The book retrieved from Daniel's lab turned out to be his latest mission journal; the notebook he always carried taking notes and making sketches. They turned quickly to the last entry. It began with a brief narrative of the walk from the stargate to the pyramid—notes about types of vegetation, lack of signs of habitation. There was a sketch of the pyramid, a detailed description of the exterior structure and the damage it had suffered, some speculation regarding its similarity to step pyramids found in Egypt.

On the fifth page of the entry, Daniel had begun sketching the symbols he found on the pyramid walls, along with what he believed the translations to be. Beside the symbol that Teal'c had identified as 'entrance' was written 'entry or open.' Next to the one the Jaffa thought was 'puzzle' Daniel had written 'solve.'

"Okay," Jack said. "That's close, right? You _solve _a _puzzle_?"

They continued to read Daniel's notes and compare his sketches to the photos Teal'c had taken. In addition to 'solve' and 'entry' Daniel had identified half a dozen other symbols: chamber; sleep/rest; time/passage of time; enclose; forever; three; glyphs. They studied the words for a while, trying to fit them together into some order that made sense. "There's a room where you sleep forever," Sam suggested. "That sounds like a tomb. Logical. After all, it's a pyramid." Not much help, however.

Jack soon gave up on the notes, and refocused his attention on Teal'c's pictures. He was standing, leaning on his crutches, with several of them spread in front of him on the table. "Hey, Carter, take a look at these."

Each picture before him focused on a stone tile; each tile had a horizontal line approximately one-third of the way from the top. Above and below the line were what appeared to be random numbers of dots, arranged in a column. The first picture had one dot above the line and two directly below, another no dots above and three below, yet another had two dots above and none below. There were ten pictures in all, no two alike. Sam and Teal'c shifted their attention to the table and studied the pictures.

"Where were these, Teal'c?" Jack asked.

"They were set in two columns, one on each side of the group of symbols, O'Neill." He arranged the pictures the way he had seen them, and they all stared at them for a few moments.

"It's a number line," Sam said. "Each tile has the same arrangement as an abacus. See, on the left, the first tile has one dot below the line, then two, three, four, and one dot above the line on the last one stands for five."

"And on the right, one above plus one below is six, then plus two below, and so forth," Teal'c added.

"And two above means ten," Jack finished, tapping the last picture. "So... the numbers one through ten. But why? Why have them there?"

No immediate answer to the question occurred to any of them. After a few minutes they went back to studying Daniel's journal. Teal'c read from it aloud, commenting as he went along about what he himself had observed in the pyramid. Two hours later, having gone through it twice, and studied every photo, they were no further along. The S&R teams were still reporting no progress.

The last two pages of the journal entry were filled with rows of numbers. Sam kept coming back to them, studying them. It seemed so random...

11111211311411511611711811911X

12112212312412512612712812912X

After several more rows, the initial digit changed;

21121221321421521621721821921X

22122222322422522622722822922X

Again there were several rows and then the first digit changed again and there were a number rows beginning with the digit 3.

And then a few beginning with 4.

The last row in the sequence looked like this;

451452453454455456457

Sam frowned at the numbers. What did they mean? Why write them down? What had Daniel been doing?

Jack's voice interrupted her concentration.

"I think it's time for a break." He sounded very tired. "I need to go to the men's room." He reached for his crutches and struggled to his feet, clumped out of the room without looking back.

"This is very difficult for O'Neill," Teal'c commented. "He is deeply concerned for DanielJackson, and dislikes being unable to act."

At that moment, an incoming wormhole was announced.

"I shall go down to the control room," Teal'c said. "I will notify you if there is anything new."

"Thanks, Teal'c." Sam gave him a half smile.

She set aside Daniel's journal. They had also retrieved several textbooks from Daniel's lab, and she opened one of the larger ones on the table and paged through it. Checking the index showed her a section on Egyptian pyramids, and she went there. She was studying a cutaway diagram of a pyramid when she heard the distinctive sound of O'Neill's crutches entering the room behind her.

"I'm thinking I'll call up for some more coffee, Colonel," she said.

When he didn't answer, she turned around. He was leaning heavily on the crutches, swaying, his face white. She hurried to his side.

She put an arm around his waist and guided him to the sofa, where he sat with his eyes closed. "Thanks, Carter... I'm okay. Just give me a minute..."

"You need to rest again, sir. It's been hours." She pulled the pillow over behind him. "Here, I'll help you lie down..."

He jerked back. "Stop it, Carter! I said I'm fine..." he snapped at her. "We need to concentrate on finding Daniel."

"I'll find him, Colonel! Teal'c and I, we'll find Daniel. I promise you." She sat beside him and put her hand on his arm. "I promise. You have to let me do this."

"Carter..."

Her fingers tightened on his arm. "Jack, please." She spoke softly, intensely. "I _will_ find him! Let me take care of it. Don't make me worry about you, too!"

He turned abruptly to stare at her. She suddenly realized she had used his first name, and she quickly removed her hand from his arm. She felt as if she were blushing all the way to the tips of her toes. He didn't say anything, just met her eyes for a moment that went on way too long. Finally he dropped his gaze and leaned back.

Sam cleared her throat and stood up. "It's about time for you meds again, sir."

"Yeah, I can tell," he said softly. In his mind he could hear her voice, whispering urgently, begging in the same tones she had just spoken—_Jack, please... please don't die. I love you, Jack. Please..._ He closed his eyes and scrubbed at his face. Had to be his imagination...right? She couldn't possibly have ever said that...

"Colonel?" She was standing in front of him with his pills and a glass of water, frowning slightly.

He took the pills and avoided Carter's eyes, looking at his watch instead. Nineteen fifty hours. Daniel had been missing for nearly eleven hours.

Jack reached for his crutches. "I'm going for a walk," he announced.

"Sir, are you sure..." Sam started to protest.

He shot her a quelling look, retrieved the crutches and made his way out of the room.

**o0o**

Left alone in the officers' lounge, Sam stared for several moments at the spot where Jack had disappeared. She heard the elevator doors open, and then the sound of his crutches as he entered the car. It was ridiculous to feel hurt by his actions, she told herself determinedly. He was only thinking about Daniel, and his own frustration...

At last she turned back to the table where Teal'c's photos still lay spread out, along with Daniel's journal and the textbooks they'd brought from his lab. Her eyes ran over the timeline in the pictures idly, then turned back to the text which was still open to the diagram she'd been looking at earlier. From there she glanced back at the page in the journal where Daniel had written his translation of the glyphs, and the pages of numbers. She frowned and leaned closer.

She was still leaning over the table when Teal'c returned with the Colonel a little while later. Straightening at the sound of their entrance, she turned to face them.

"Teal'c, by any chance did you touch the tiles on the wall where Daniel was working?"

"I did."

"Were they set solidly, or could you move them?"

Teal'c raised an eyebrow slightly. "It did seem to me that some of the tiles moved slightly when I pressed them, CaptainCarter."

Sam smiled. "I think I know where Daniel is," she announced.

**o0o**

"How did we get in here?" Mel asked, still a bit shocked at Daniel's announcement that they were inside the pyramid.

"Some kind of transporter technology, is my guess," he explained, still searching the walls with the flashlight beam. "Aha! There..." He pinpointed a spot about five feet up on the stones, near the place where Mel had awakened. She looked up. There was definitely something different there; a panel inset into the stone, made of metal. Daniel went over to the wall and reached out and touched the panel.

"Oww!" He jerked his hand away. "Damn—it gave me a shock!" His hand was burning, and when he turned the light on it, he saw that his fingers and palm were indeed burned. He waved his hand, trying to shake the pain away.

Mel went for the first aid kit. "Here, let me see," she said, returning with the box. "That's nasty!" While she treated his hand, he explained what he thought had happened.

"The code that I worked out wasn't for a door, like I thought. It activated the transporter, and we were both within the beaming range. But it appears to be shorting out, so maybe that's why we don't remember what happened. The shock must have knocked us unconscious. And I fell on that rock, making it worse."

"How do we get back out?" she asked, taping up the bandage. "We can't touch the panel."

Daniel put his uninjured hand to his head. "I don't know." He groaned. "That shock set my headache off again." He sat down below the panel, with his back to the wall.

Mel dropped down beside him. "You okay?"

"Not sure. I feel kind of sick."

"That's the concussion, I expect," she said. "Why don't you lie down?"

Daniel stretched out on the ground. After a few minutes the nausea began to abate. "Well, at least we know what we're up against now," he said.

They were quiet for a while. Mel turned off the light. She listened as Daniel's breathing evened out; after a few minutes, she thought he had fallen asleep. She closed her eyes, frustrated, trying to work out how they could escape.

**o0o**

"Inside the pyramid?" General Hammond exclaimed in surprise when he arrived in the lounge, and had heard Carter's conclusion. "What makes you think so? How would they have gotten there?"

"I think there's a door, operated by pressing a series of numbers on the wall slab, sir." She showed the General the number line pictures. By now, Teal'c had arranged all of the pictures as they had appeared on the wall, with the two columns of numbers on each side and fifteen squares with symbols on them arranged in between. "If you get the right sequence of numbers, the door opens. I think they got in, and then the door shut behind them and trapped them. Maybe there's damage and they can't operate it from the inside... no way to know. The glyphs in the middle of the slab are the clue for the code. Daniel had worked out a translation for most of them. Roughly it says something like this; _Three symbols allow entrance into the chamber of those who rest eternally_."

"So, the right code gets you in," Jack said.

"Yes, sir."

"How do we know the right code?" he demanded.

"That's what Daniel was working on here, Colonel," she said. "This page of numbers. At first it looks random, but if you break it into groups of three you can see a progression." She held up the page where she had inserted a red slash after every third digit.

121/122/123/124/125/126/127/128/129/12X

She read one of the lines. "One two _one_, one two _two_, one two _three_. And so on through all the possibilities beginning with one-two."

"What's with the X at the ends?" Jack asked.

"He used it to stand for ten. The tile with the symbol for ten is only one tile, not two digits. So it fits into the pattern as a single symbol. One two _ten_. He was working out all the combinations."

"And the correct one...?" Jack questioned, looking at the page again. "...should be the last one he wrote down! Right?"

"I believe so, sir." She pointed to the last three-digit group. "Four five seven."

"Well, let's go and try it out!" Jack exclaimed.

"Sorry, Colonel," Hammond said. "But you can't go through the stargate in the shape you're in."

Jack sputtered for a moment, then ground his teeth. "Carter, Teal'c—go find him!"

**o0o**

Mel was startled awake when their radios crackled to life. "Daniel! ...tenant Stark! This... Sam Carter... Can... hear me?" The message was broken, but understandable. "Dan... Please respond! ...inside the pyramid?"

Mel switched the light on and grabbed for her radio, hitting the send button. "This is Stark, Captain Carter! Dr. Jackson and I are inside the pyramid! I say again—Dr. Jackson and I are inside the pyramid!"

"Are you... all right? Lieutenant...?"

"This is Stark! We are okay. Dr. Jackson has a concussion, but he's awake." She grinned over at Daniel who was sitting up now. "Do you want to talk to him?"

"...yes. Daniel...you there?"

He switched on his radio. "I'm here, Sam."

"Daniel, ...you okay? We found... door code. I think... can get in."

"What?" he said, and then realizing what she planned to do, he yelled into the radio. "No! Sam, stop! Stop! Don't use the code! Don't use the code! Stop!"

"Daniel...?" Her voice came over the radio.

"Sam, listen. Do not try to get in! It's not a door! I repeat, not a door." He drew a breath. "Do you hear me? Do not use the code!"

His urgency must have transmitted over the radio, because she replied, "All right, Dan... hear you. I won't... Why? What's...pening?"

"Sam, it's a transporter. A beaming device. And it's not working properly. We got big electrical shocks from it. Both of us were unconscious for a long time. Do you understand, Sam?"

"I hear..." she answered. "Malfunction... transporter...? Transp...? Really? Amazing! Hold on..." The radio cut out for several minutes. When Sam's voice came back, it was clearer and stronger. "Daniel, are you there? Is that better?"

"Much better, Sam."

"Good. We attached a signal amplifier to the radio. I think the high metal content in the stones is interfering with the signal. Are you two all right? Did Lt. Stark say you have a concussion?"

"Yes, I think so." Daniel's head was pounding. "I'm gonna hand you over to her now to explain." He nodded to Mel and leaned back against the wall again, closing his eyes.

Mel took over the radio, and related what had happened to them.

"Are you all right, Lieutenant?" Sam asked, when Mel was finished.

"Yes, ma'am. A couple of bruises, that's all. "But I think Dan...uh, Dr. Jackson's concussion is pretty severe. He's in pain, and keeps zoning out on me."

"Okay. Don't let him move around any more than necessary. Have you got water?"

"We have two canteens, ma'am; one is full, the other about half."

"All right. Someone will stay here on the radio, and keep you informed about what we're going to do. Check in if anything changes, or if you just want to talk. And don't worry. We'll get you out of there."

"Thank you, ma'am."

Sam handed over the radio to Major Whitman of SG17, and headed back to the gate.

**o0o**

It took nearly eighteen hours to excavate enough of the pyramid to bring Daniel and Mel out. Some of those hours were spent pinpointing their exact location inside, and determining the best way to dig them out without bringing the whole structure down on top of them. Three times during that period the transporter was used to send in food, water and medical supplies. Part of the transporter's malfunction, they discovered, was that objects materialized approximately five feet above the floor of the pyramid. Which explained the severity of Daniel's injury. The supplies all went through fine, except for some minor breakage due to the fall.

Once they were out, Daniel and Mel were both taken directly to the infirmary, where Janet found that Mel was fine, except for a few bruises and abrasions. The shock from the transporter had left no residual symptoms. Daniel was not as lucky; his concussion was serious enough to keep him in bed for the next two days. He slept most of the first day, and each time he did wake up, Sam or Teal'c was beside him. When he finally woke feeling like himself, he discovered that Jack was sleeping in the bed next to his.

"Janet readmitted him," Sam told him, keeping her voice low. She was perched on the edge of Daniel's bed. "He was so exhausted, she was afraid if she let him stay up, he'd fall and re-injure himself. Even after we figured out where you were, he refused to back off and rest. When they brought you in unconscious, he stayed by your bed until he nearly fell out of the chair. She put him there beside you, so he can watch you."

"Doesn't look like he's doing much watching right now," Daniel said with a grin. "In fact, he looks worse than I feel."

"He was very worried about you. And frustrated because he couldn't do anything. You know the Colonel."

"Yeah. I know what you mean." Daniel glanced over at Jack, then turned back to Sam. "How did you figure out where we were?"

"It was really the only option left, if you think about it," she replied. "There was no sign you were captured, no evidence of a ship having landed, and there's no ring platform there. In fact, there's nothing to indicate that anyone else has been on that planet for decades. You simply vanished. I was looking at one of your textbooks that had cutaway diagrams of an Egyptian pyramid, and noticed that it had a secret room, with a concealed entrance. We knew from your journal that you were examining the glyphs to solve some sort of puzzle. Teal'c took pictures of them and we discovered the number line. So I started to wonder if there was a code that opened a secret room. A _transporter _never occurred to me, though," she admitted. "I thought it was a door, and you'd gone through, and gotten trapped inside."

"I thought it was a door, too," Daniel said. He paused a minute, considering. "I think we're lucky we survived the transporter—the thing was damaged."

"Yes it was. Probably happened when the roof collapsed. You were very lucky."

"Have you examined it?"

"Yes. It's not like any technology I've ever seen. And the damage is pretty bad, so I don't know if I'll be able to figure it out, much less reverse engineer it." She sounded disappointed and Daniel could understand that. she hated not being able to figure out how things worked.

Just then a head peeked around the curtains. "Hello," Mel Stark said. She caught sight of Sam. "Sorry, Captain. I didn't mean to interrupt."

"Hi, Mel." Daniel smiled. "Come on in."

"I don't want to disturb you..."

"You're not," Sam assured her.

"I just wanted to see how Dan... uh, Dr. Jackson is doing."

"Improving," he said. "And it's still Daniel, like I said before."

"Come and sit," Sam said, indicating the chair. "How are _you_ feeling, Lieutenant?"

"Oh, I'm fine, ma'am. I won't stay but a minute—I'll just stand here." She smiled at Sam a bit shyly. "Thanks for getting us out of there, Captain."

"It was our pleasure, believe me."

**o0o**

The low conversation around Daniel's bed had slowly penetrated Jack's sleep. He slitted his eyes open and looked in that direction. Daniel had visitors. Carter was sitting on the side of his bed and Lt. Stark was standing at the foot. God, another gorgeous woman hanging around the boy archeologist! Stark reminded him of that actress—_Hallie something or other. She even has the ultra-short haircut. And here comes Janet, with her super smile. Maybe it's Daniel's aftershave..._

He slipped back into sleep, relieved that all the members of his team were safe and accounted for.

The next time Jack woke, the lighting had dimmed in the infirmary. Which probably meant it was nighttime. The curtain between his and Daniel's bed was drawn most of the way—he could only see the top of Daniel's head. He was turned away from Jack, talking to someone...

"Is he going to be all right?" Daniel asked in a low voice. "I mean, it's been hours and he's hardly moved..."

"Janet says he'll be fine, with some rest." Carter's voice. "She was going to sedate him, but he fell asleep almost as soon as he hit the bed."

Jack wondered vaguely who they were talking about.

"He didn't sleep except for a couple of hours the whole time you were missing," Carter went on. "I guess he's making up for it now."

_Oh,_ Jack thought. _Guess they're talking about me._ He was still too tired for that to worry him.

"Well, he deserves to rest," Daniel said. There was a pause. "Sam, are you okay? What's wrong?"

She sighed. "Oh, Daniel. Nothing really. The Colonel was...I don't know. Very short with me. Every time I tried to make him take it easy, he..."

"It's just that he was worried, Sam," Daniel reassured her. "And frustrated because he couldn't do anything about it."

"I know. I'm too sensitive, I guess." She sighed again. "Once I caught him looking at me strangely, and I realized I'd called him 'Jack.' I slipped, I guess... I don't know what he thought."

"Hey, I wouldn't worry," Daniel tried to reassure her. "He'll forget about it. Or ignore it." His voice changed. "How're you doing with... you know?"

She laughed softly, but there was no amusement in the sound. "About the same. I'll be all right. Don't worry about me, Daniel. You just get well."

"I'll be fine in a few days, Sam," Daniel assured her. "And before long everything will be back to normal."

_Yeah_, Jack thought, as he closed his eyes. _Back to normal._ As he fell asleep he could hear again Carter's urgent whisper; _Please don't die, Jack. I love you. Please... _


End file.
